Frozen Air
by HANAJIMA UCHIHA
Summary: Sequal to Second Chance. With Pariah gone, the ghost hunting team finds themselves gazing into a prosperous future, but perhaps it just might be thier very demise.
1. Graduation Part One

**Welcome to the sequel!**

**I warn you now, Dani will be sixteen and in a MATURE relationship with Dan. This story is not a lemon, but such situations will be implied.**

**If you feel Dani is too young, or you dislike this pairing for any such reason, you are free to leave now. I take legitimate flames, not ones saying 'this pairing sucks'. If you don't like this pairing, why did you even click on the story? **

**It says 'Dani' and 'Dan' and the genre is 'romance'. I hope that gives you a hint, otherwise we are going to have a serious problem.**

**Another thing, this story takes place when everyone is graduating from high school. Some characters may seem OC-ish, but you have to keep in mind that people change. 4 years is a long time, and it can completely turn a person around.**

**Trust me, I know.**

**That aside, I give you the first chapter to Part two of our saga. **

"**Frozen Air"**

**

* * *

**

Chapter One: Graduation Part One; Keeping Up With The Ghost Hunters

"Daniel Fenton." Mr. Lancer called his name, signaling Danny to walk out of his seat and receive his diploma.

Danny was so happy, he could have cried. He hadn't been able to pull his grades out of the gutter, resulting in a GPA too low for him to be able to walk on stage, but Vlad stepped in on his behalf.

The school had mysteriously received a substantial 'donation' from an 'unknown' beneficiary under the conditions that they would allow Daniel Fenton to graduate on stage.

How could the broke school system resist?

Danny took his diploma with a huge smile on his face. The nightmare they call high school was finally over!

He returned to his seat with a contented sigh. He would have to thank Vlad for this later.

Now that he thought about it, it seemed like he was spending a lot of time with Vlad lately.

Danny remembered it beginning with Vlad becoming cleverer in his manipulative techniques shortly after they defeated Pariah.

* * *

"_Maddie, Jack, why don't I take Daniel off your hands for awhile?" Vlad set his coffee mug down on the table with a smile on his face._

_Danny spit out the mouthful of cereal he was chewing. _

_Jack's face lit up at the suggestion. "Why, that's a great idea! Danny would get to spend some real quality time with his Uncle Vlad!"_

_Danny cringed. "Actually, Dad, I already made plans with Sam and Tucker-"_

"_Nonsense! It's summer break, you can always go out with them tomorrow!"_

"_So, it's settled then!" Vlad said excitedly. _

And so, Danny spent the entire day following Vlad around in City Hall. Under the normal circumstances, he would have been bored out of his mind, but thanks to a little resourcefulness, Danny had a blast.

* * *

_Danny rapped his fingers against the table top as he waited for someone to pick up the other line. After a few rings, he finally got a response._

"_Hello?" Dan's voice came from the other line._

"_Dan, can you put Dani on the line?" _

"_Sure, hold on a second." Dan's distant voice called out to Dani._

_Danny heard small footsteps approach the receiver. _

"_Hello?"_

"_Dani, you have to help me!" _

"_What's wrong?" _

"_I'm stuck spending the day with the Fruitloop, and I'm bored out of my mind!" Danny pulled at his own hair to emphasize the point to himself, not that the female halfa could see it anyways._

"_I'll be right there! Where are you?"_

"_City Hall."_

_Just as she said, Dani phased into the office minutes later. "Here I am!" She threw her hands in the air as if expecting a round of applause. "What should we do first?" _

_

* * *

_

After thinking it over for a bit, the two ended up office-chair jousting.

The pushed two office chairs to the far ends of the room. Using brooms, which the stole from the janitor's closet, they would push themselves from the wall and use the brooms to try and knock the other person off their chair.

The first match had been a dud; with the halfas underestimating the distances between each other, but the second time around was a success.

Dani had gotten the smart idea of knocking over the entire chair, rather than just Danny. As his chair came closer to her, she flipped her broom and lodged it in the wheels of his chair.

The wheels locked in place, sending Danny and the chair crashing to the ground.

"_That's cheating!" he cried from his heap on the floor._

"_You said I had to knock you over, you never said how I had to do it." Dani spun her chair around to face Danny. _

"_Fine, if you want to play that way."_

_The continued their little game until Danny lost his grip on his broom and watched it fly through the air, right through Vlad's computer monitor. _

_The two stood completely motionless for a minute, mouths gaping as they stared at the shattered screen. _

_Danny walked over and picked up the broken pieces of glass. "Okay, it's time we played a new game. It's called 'Hide the broken screen from Vlad.'" _

_When Vlad returned an hour later, he was not at all surprised to see Dani there. He had heard the shouting and crashing from the meeting room downstairs. Looking throughout the rest of the room, he couldn't help but notice something missing. "What happened to my computer?"_

"_What computer? There was never any computer in here, right Dani?" _

"_Right."_

_The two had nervous smiles on their faces as Vlad continued to look about the room._

_The oldest halfa was slightly annoyed, but teenagers would be teenagers. What could he do? "Alright you two, let's go get something for lunch."_

_

* * *

_

Little by little, Vlad continued requesting both of the halfas' presence.

He wouldn't just leave them in a room; rather, he would teach them how to run his businesses, how to make a stock portfolio, judging good and bad investments, handling foolish business partners (without wasting them), and how to keep floating in tough economic times.

Neither of the teen halfas wanted to tag along with Vlad, but Danny's parents forced him to go and Danielle couldn't very well abandon her brother in the evil, boring clutches of the fruitloop.

The teens thought Vlad was only doing this so he could have the two of them for himself, but they soon learned his true intentions.

* * *

"_This is where the computer chips are programmed." Vlad was showing the two halfas the inner workings of Axion Labs. The group was standing in the glass-covered walkway, overlooking the production line of ghostly weapons. _

"_There are computer chips in ecto-guns?" Dani had her face pressed up against the glass, trying to get a better look._

"_Yes, they maintain the levels of ectoplasm release." Vlad ushered the two to continue moving. "Now as we…" He stopped for a moment and grabbed a hold of the railing. The room seemed to go in and out of focus for a moment. _

"_Vlad, are you okay?" Dani saw the man's knees shake a little._

"_I'm fine, dear. Just feeling a little tired. Shall we carry on?" Vlad walked a few more steps ahead of the teens before collapsing._

"_Vlad!" They both rushed to his side._

_The two halfas were seated next to each other in the hospital's waiting room. Danny's parents were seated across from them._

_Danny's eyes nervously wafted throughout the room, mostly stopping on the light above the intensive care unit. He tried to convince himself that he wasn't worried about the psychotic man, but his sense of guilt over rode the idea. _

_Damn his superhero persona!_

_After what seemed like ages, the light above the unit finally went out as a doctor walked out the door. _

_Jack was the first person to react. "How is he?" He jumped up in front of the doctor._

"_Mr. Masters had a stroke, but it looks like he will be just fine, giving he doesn't have a relapse. In the meantime, Mr. Masters' lawyer has arrived. He wants to speak to you in private." The doctor removed his disposable gloves, tossed them in the garbage, and left the group with the lawyer._

"_Hello. I am Joshua Masson; I presume you are the Fentons?" _

"_Yes, that would be us." Maddie closed the magazine she had been reading._

"_In the circumstance that Mr. Masters does not make it, I have been instructed to distribute his property as written in his will." Joshua fished around in his briefcase for a moment until he found the slip of paper he was looking for. "Mr. and Mrs. Fenton are to continue receiving funding for their ghost research. All other funds, accounts, bonds, business stocks, and estates are to be split between Danielle and Danielle Fenton. That is all; you can reach me here if necessary." He handed them his business card and left. _

"_You're last name is Fenton?" Maddie raised her eyebrow at Dani._

_Neither of the halfas responded. They were both too deep in shock._

_Vlad left everything to them?_

_Was this the reason he was showing them how to run and manage all his business affairs? Did he know he was going to die soon? Maybe this was just another evil scheme of his._

_Regardless of his motives, the two were going to have to ask him when he woke up. _

_

* * *

_

_As soon as they entered Vlad's hospital ward, Danny spit out the question nagging at the back of his mind. "Vlad, are you going to die?"_

"_Heavens no!" The billionaire was shocked to hear them ask something like that. "At least, not anytime soon I hope."_

_The two teens continued staring at him in silence._

_Vlad sighed. "I suppose you heard from Joshua?"_

_They nodded._

"_Have a seat." Vlad gestured for them to sit down on the nearby chairs. He propped himself up. "I've been dragging the two of you along with me at work because I'm trying to teach you the in's and out's of my companies. I'm not doing this to force you two into becoming my apprentices, I'm doing this because I'm trying to secure your futures. Daniel, I know you strive to be an astronaut, but reality dictates that you cannot become one. It's not just your grades holding you down, but your physical body. Part of being an astronaut means getting health check-ups. Do you know what that means?"_

_Danny thought about it for a second. "No."_

"_It means blood tests! Do you know what's in your bloodstream?"_

"_Uh…blood?"_

"_Ectoplasm, Daniel! As soon as they have a look at your blood sample, you would be shipped off to the Guys-in-White facility for experimentation. I'm sorry, Daniel, but it's the truth."_

_Daniel was so angry, he could have punched Vlad right then and there, hospitalized and all. Everything he said was true, but did he really have to crush his dreams like that? That idea had been eating away at him, but Danny had chosen to ignore it all these years. _

_Before he could respond, Vlad spoke again. "As for you, Danielle, you may have forged legal documents, but you still do not exist in the eyes of the government. If you decide to go and work in the real world, you would be found and forced into a life of constant travel, but before all of that, this is my way of apologizing."_

_Danny's anger was cut short at those words. "Apologizing? You're not trying to bribe us, are you?"_

"_No! Listen, both of you, I have come to terms with the fact that I cannot force either of you into being my children, but that doesn't mean I want you out of my life completely. Besides, now I have a handsome nephew and a beautiful niece." _

_The two continued to stare at him in silence as he placed a hand on each of their heads._

"_I know I've caused the two of you a lot of pain, and that you may never forgive me for what I've done, but by doing this I can forgive myself."_

_

* * *

_

"_That bastard! How dare he get us in his moment of weakness like that!" Dani shouted as soon as the two halfas were in the air._

_After Vlad's apology they had phased out of the hospital for a little flight in hopes of clearing their heads a bit. _

"_Yeah, it was a cheap shot, but what do you think? Should we forgive him?"_

_Dani scoffed. "Just like that? Not only did he use me, but he's also tried to kill me, TWICE! Heck, he's even tried to kill you! He says sorry and everything is suddenly candy and gumdrops? I don't think so!"_

"_Dan tried to kill me, but I forgave him." Danny nudged her with his elbow._

"_Yeah? Well…this is different." Dani moved away from his nudging._

"_How so?"_

"_Why are willing to forgive him?" Dani quickly changed the subject._

"_Well, Vlad has kind of toned it down on the evil plot stuff this past year. I think we should give him a chance. Besides, if he goes against us we can always beat him up again."_

_Dani grumbled to herself. Danny was right. "I'm still not sure."_

_Danny had a small smile on his face. He waggled his eyebrows at Dani._

_The female halfa's face fell again as she ran her hand over his face. "Fine, I'll forgive him, but you have to swear to me you will never do that gain. Seriously, that's creepy." _

"_It got the job done."_

_

* * *

_

As they forgave Vlad, Vlad himself began trying to set things straight with the other ghost hunters, starting with Valerie.

Knowing her 'Shoot first, Ask never' personality, he figured it wouldn't be in his best interest to approach her personally.

First, he sent her a long letter apologizing for what he had done, and offering her a position in Axion Labs.

Valerie knew how to bear a grudge, but had to relent and accept the elder man's apology.

With the pay Vlad was offering her, she would finally be able to move her and her father out of their rundown apartment and into a real house somewhere in the suburbian sprawl of Amity Park.

The health benefits only sweetened the deal.

Reluctantly, she went to see Vlad in his office to accept the position.

Vlad had been more than happy to have another extremely skilled ghost hunter on his side. He assured her than he would not repeat his previous mistake nor would he hide anything from her.

To emphasize that point, Valerie was granted access to all databases under the DALV Corporation.

Her job was the same as before, mostly hunting down ghost specimens for Vlad, but this time around, she used more precaution. She would study her targets closely, learning about their strengths and possible weaknesses, and whether they were actually good or evil before going in for the capture.

* * *

Tucker and Sam did not hold as much against Vlad.

Their only real quarrel was his constant attempts to hurt their best friends, but they were willing to forgive Vlad if everyone else was.

Tucker had received his own letter from Vlad, but not under the apologetic terms.

As it turned out, Vlad would hire Technus to do most of his software programming and maintenance, but with him gone, Vlad could not find a single competent worker to fill his place. He knew of Tucker's advanced computer skills, leading him to request his help.

Tucker would help with basic software engineering and even some electrical problems the building might be having.

He wasn't an employee like Valerie, but was paid for each job he did instead. His parents would get too suspicious if he was suddenly hired out of the blue by a multi-billion dollar corporation.

Vlad could have hired better, more educated people, but he chose not to. It's not that he was sentimental by hiring those closest to him, but his need to keep people's eyes from watching his companies and his need to keep an eye out on those who knew of his secret. If they wandered too far, things might begin slipping out, and Vlad could not have that.

The Paranormal business was a little shady as is; Vlad didn't need someone outside the halfa circle finding about his strong connection to the Ghost Zone then blabbing about it to the government. He was already having enough trouble with the GiW.

* * *

"Samantha Manson."

Danny looked up from his diploma to see his girlfriend walk up to the podium and accept her diploma.

He smiled to himself.

Their relationship had managed to last this long. Not that they were having any problems, it just made Danny realize how much he treasured Sam.

When they first started, the two of them were so shy. They had no problem exchanging affection in private, but it was a little embarrassing to hold hands in public. Gradually they lost their timid demeanor and became more open.

When their two year anniversary rolled around, he and Sam went all the way. (If you know what he means.)

It had to be the most pleasurable moment in their life.

Never had they experienced euphoria like that, never had they felt such a longing for each other so strong.

At this point, if something were to ever happen to Sam, Danny wouldn't know what to do with himself.

* * *

Sam didn't really fit into Vlad's companies anywhere.

She mostly hung around with Danny, keeping his office tidy or just keeping him company.

The billionaire had tried again and again to find some place for the Goth girl, but she didn't poses anything remarkable.

Of course, he had never spoken to her directly about this (It would be too awkward a conversation), but he kept his eyes peeled for anything that might come up, and sure enough it came.

* * *

_The door burst open as the two government officials rolled into the room._

_Sam and Danny stopped in their tracks as_

"_Daniel Fenton, you are under arrest for tax evasion!" Operative O put his ecto-gun up straight for the halfa._

"_What? I don't pay taxes!" Danny stared up from the laptop he was working on in disbelief. Were these guys serious?_

"_Exactly. By order of the government we are to seize all _property_ containing possible information about your fraudulent behavior." They were about to start taking apart the file cabinet when Sam intervened. _

"_Excuse me boys." Sam slammed her hand down on the top of the filing cabinet. "Exactly what part of the government do you work for?"_

"_The ministry of paranormal activities." Operative M replied._

"_Well I do believe that tax evasion is beyond your jurisdiction." She calmly shut the drawer to the cabinet._

_The two agents were so angry they could have fired their guns at Sam. They had chosen this opportunity to strike because they knew Vlad wouldn't be there, but unbeknownst to them, Vlad was there._

_He had been standing invisibly outside the room to see how Daniel would have handed such a situation, but was shocked when Sam resolved the conflict. _

_The two white-clad men stormed out the door right past Vlad._

_That evening, Vlad summoned Sam to his office and discussed the possibility of having her as a lawyer. After all, Joshua was starting to get a little suspicious of Vlad's ability to make people hand over their companies to him. _

_Now, Sam had zero experience or formal education with law, but after some negotiating, they settled on a path._

_After a good three hours of arguing, they were able to reach a conclusion. _

_Vlad had wanted to ship Sam straight to Harvard for a law degree, but she refused. _

_She did not even have an interest in law (she wanted to be a veterinarian), but Vlad played the 'you'll get to be working with Daniel' card, successfully winning her over. _

_Sam agreed on eventually becoming a lawyer, but did not want to attend Harvard. She got her wish of starting off at community college for the first two years, but had to settle with finishing her degree in Harvard. _

_Boy would her parents be happy. _

* * *

Sam winked to Danny on her way back to her seat.

Danny returned it with a wink of his own.

"Please, spare us, lover-boy." Dani pulled Danny's cap down over his eyes.

* * *

**And we conclude the first part of the second chapter!**

**I hate it! I'm actually kind of embarrassed to be posting this up…**

**You can thank Lani's Tamer-chi for convincing me to write a sequel. The story was supposed to end where it did in 'Second Chance'.**

**As you can tell, I enjoy swapping time periods without informing you as to where we are. It's half the fun of being an author. **

**So once again, people will be in mature relationships, but there will be no lemon. This story is rated T and I plan to keep it that way. **

**Tell me if you guys like what you see.**

**Review Please!**


	2. Graduation Part Two

**EXPLOSION! **

**Problem Solved.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters.**

* * *

Chapter Two: Graduation Part Two; Keeping Up With The Ghosts

"Please give a special round of applause to Danielle Fenton, this year's Valedictorian." Mr. Lancer's voice blared through the speakers.

Dani prepared herself to receive her diploma and, as stated, she was the Valedictorian. That could only mean thing for her.

Time to put on a show!

With great precision, Dani launched herself into a series of flips up to the podium. She accepted her diploma from Mr. Lancer, faced the audience, gave a bow, and threw herself into another set of flips back to her seat.

Dani turned to Danny. "That is how you celebrate!"

"You showoff." Danny rolled his eyes at her.

"Whatever." Dani turned to the bleachers, skimming through them until she saw a little hand waving at her. Dani waved back and flashed the girl a smile.

How Dani envied Ember so for having a daughter as adorable as Victoria.

* * *

A few weeks after the defeat of Pariah, Skulker and Ember finally tied the knot.

Something about being separated so many times during that nightmare made them realize that they did want to spend their eternal after-life together.

Two months later, Ember gave birth to a daughter, Victoria Lena McLain, but everyone called her 'Viki' for short.

Ember was not the only one to be blessed with a child.

Three days after Victoria's birth, Box Lunch was born.

Those were the three most peaceful days the Ghost Zone had ever seen. Many similar days followed after, as there was a baby boom.

The place wasn't crawling with children, but there was a higher than average birthrate.

It wasn't just the baby boom that led to the few months of peace.

Ghosts everywhere were picking up the pieces of the mess Pariah had left behind. They didn't have time for their rivalries or petty arguments.

Unfortunately, the peace was short lived, and within four months after the defeat, everything returned to the way it had been before the nightmare.

Dani had still maintained her friendship with Box Ghost and Lunch Lady and, as in the previous timeline; she was named her God Mother.

Box Lunch had the same appearance as before, but Viki was really a sight to behold.

Viki had her parents' flaming hair, but her father's hair color all let down in a straight green mass reaching her waist. She had her mother's pale white skin with a rather lithe figure. She usually wore a black tank top with matching black pants.

Dani loved the two children dearly, always volunteering to baby-sit for them, but she rarely got to baby-sit Viki seeing as Spectra was her God Mother.

Only because of Spectra's full hospital ward was Viki with Dani.

Spectra had briefly mentioned something about a flu spreading through the Ghost Zone before dropping the little girl off.

Viki was very friendly, allowing her to make friends easily. She, Box Lunch, and Evella could always be found playing together.

* * *

Dani found it rather interesting to see the ghosts become parents.

The first time she saw Box Ghost dote on his daughter, she had almost broken into a fit of laughter. For one, he was speaking softly to her, not his usual screaming-in-an-attempt-to-look-more-intimidating.

Even Skulker and Ember's parenting skills could be seen in Viki's personality.

Viki may have been playful, but she was also very clever and cunning, having gained these skills by learning to hunt from her father, but as a child she did not quite understand how to use the skills properly.

* * *

_Ember sat on the couch, guitar in her lap as she absent mindedly tuned and fiddled with the strings._

_Youngblood had arrived earlier in the day to play with Viki, and the two children were currently outside of the layer playing whatever games children played nowadays._

_As Ember continued to pull and twang the strings, she heard screaming coming from outside. At once, she dropped her guitar and ran outside to see what was wrong._

_Much to her relief, it wasn't Viki who was screaming, rather, it was Youngblood who was hanging upside down from a tree, swinging directly over a spike trap._

"_Viki! You're insane! Let me down!" Youngblood swung around, trying to grab the rope that was tied around his foot._

_Viki only laughed in response and she threatened to cut the rope right there, leading to Youngblood's inevitable fall into the spike trap._

"_Victoria Lena McClain!" Ember's authoritative voice sounded._

_Viki stopped her laughter immediately. She knew she was in trouble when her mother called her by her full name. "Yes, Mommy?" She asked nervously._

"_What do you think you are doing, young lady?"_

"_I'm playing." She answered sheepishly._

"_What is that, then?" Ember pointed to the traps the little girl had set up._

"_Daddy showed me how to do this!" Viki completely forgot about being in trouble to show off her newly acquired skill. _

_Ember let out a sigh. She was going to have to talk to her husband about the things he was teaching Viki._

* * *

As good as Viki was with setting up hunting traps of sorts, she actually had not enjoyed hunting at first.

The very first time she had seen her father bring home a hunt, she had burst into tears.

It took hours of consolation from Skulker to get her to stop crying. They had to convince her that the animal was not dead (Not an easy task seeing as there was ectoplasm all over its fur) and that Skulker had not harmed it in anyway.

Luckily, she had been two at the time and could not relate that night's dinner to her father's hunt.

As she grew she became more accepting of hunting (much to Skulker's relief).

It wasn't until her father began teaching her how to hunt that she discovered her hidden talent. Everything seemed to come to her naturally. She knew how to stay hidden, how to suppress her ectoplasmic signature, and how to properly skin, handle, and dispose of her prey.

Of course, Skulker was ecstatic, but Ember begged to differ.

It was nice to see her daughter but she hoped that her daughter would pick up a hobby that wasn't so…bloody.

Ember tried to get her daughter into music, but it wasn't as easy as she thought it would be.

Viki did develop many of her mother's musical abilities, but she did not enjoy using them as much as she enjoyed using her hunting capabilities. She could sing a lullaby so soft that it put anyone who listened to sleep. She could play the flute so nicely that it would attract animals (Of course Viki would pounce as soon as they got close enough).

Nonetheless, her mother kept pushing her to use her musical abilities for purposes other than hunting.

* * *

The other ghosts weren't doing too bad themselves.

Spectra, Kitty, and Ember welcomed Desiree and Dani into their little circle of friends.

At first, they had to practically drag Desiree to any outing, but with time Desiree warmed up to the idea of having friends and stopped viewing herself as a burden to the group.

Desiree may have developed her first friendship, but her previous schizoid behaviors were still a little hard to shake off.

The girls still had to convince her that her presence was not a 'burden' nor was she being a 'bother' to them.

Dani herself had no problem fitting into the circle of friends, having already known the ghost girls intimately before the battle.

* * *

Kitty and Johnny were still in their on-off relationship, but Kitty always kept him in line.

The two still visited Amity Park regularly for entertainment, but Johnny was a little more cautious around Kitty.

He knew how angry she could get.

Unfortunately, that didn't stop him from oogling the local girls.

* * *

Spectra and Bertrand still continued their medical practice.

It was mostly Bertrand though, with Spectra working for Vlad.

When she wasn't needed at the Axion Labs, she would go back and help him out.

Now was one of those rare instances in which she had no choice but to help. This happened every few years. An old strain of a ghostly virus would spread, causing wide-spread sickness.

Spectra had been working in the medical field for centuries, having long ago gained immunity to the virus, but other ghosts were still prone to it, leading to the overcrowded clinic.

Even with this great new opportunity, Spectra still seemed to down little by little every day.

It was then that the girls took it upon themselves to approach her.

* * *

"_Spectra, what's wrong? You seem upset lately." Ember asked._

_After some negotiating it was decided that Dani and Ember would be the ones to approach Spectra. _

_They concluded that the best time to approach Spectra was when she was working in the research facility at Axion Labs. It was a clever tactic because she couldn't phase out of the room and she couldn't claim to be busy._

"_Spectra?" Dani called into the laboratory with Ember in tow._

"_I'm back here!" Her voice echoed throughout the sleek room._

_The two girls walked to the source and waited for her to finish up her business._

_Spectra finally pulled her goggles off, snapped her rubber gloves off, and removed her lab coat. "This is strange. You don't normally come visit me when I'm working."_

"_We didn't have any other choice." Ember's voice was firm. Spectra was not going to wiggle her way out of this again. "Why have you been so upset? Don't try and hide it! We can see right through you."_

_Spectra simply turned away. "It's not important."_

"_Spectra, of course it's important." Dani took a gentler approach when dealing with the older woman. For all she knew, it could have been something incredibly personal. "You're not depressed are you?"_

_Spectra burst into laughter at this. "You guys are hilarious, but it's nothing like that! It's just that delivering all these kids has made me realize how much I want one. Unfortunately, I'm sterile and can't have one of my own."_

_It was that little discussion that had prompted Ember to make Spectra Viki's God Mother._

* * *

Spectra had indeed been delivering many children, most for people residing in Aragon's kingdom.

The Dragon ghost had opened his doors to any ghosts who needed a place to live. After all, he couldn't rule a kingdom with no subjects.

Many ghosts accepted the invitation willingly.

How could they resist? They were being offered a home, in a once prosperous kingdom, being protected by a man who helped take Pariah Dark down.

As with all wars, a baby boom soon followed. Not to say that everyone was having children, but there were at least a few dozen children born along with the newly formed children ghosts of humans who had passed on before they could reach maturity.

As the kingdom filled, the land soon resembled its former glory.

Aragon had been a tad reluctant at first, but little by little, he allowed technology to flow into the large island.

He himself had never been able to get the hang of it, but his subjects and sister had no problem adjusting to the movement of time.

In fact, it wasn't unusual to see Aragon wander his castle at night with a candle when a light switch was within his fingertips.

As often as she tried, Dora simply couldn't teach her brother how to use electricity, let alone all the new appliances located in the castle. Again and again she would demonstrate, but he didn't understand.

When Tucker had gifted Alasdair a computer on his birthday, it took an entire day to teach Aragon how to turn it on.

Eventually, Dora gave up. Besides, Aragon did not really need to know how to use any of the fancy new gadgets. He had people who would do that for him.

* * *

Sure enough, Aragon's kingdom continued to exceed in economic terms and Aragon was a smart man. He knew how to use this to his advantage.

First, he invited Ghostwriter to take up a residence in his kingdom.

Ghostwriter had been surprised when he received the invitation, from Aragon himself, none the less. Why would the man suddenly have an interest in him?

Aragon told the librarian that he needed someone who can tutor the new children being added to his kingdom. That and he needed a library as the last had burned down.

Ghostwriter turned the invitation down multiple times, preparing to remain in his desolate corner of the Ghost Zone, but was won over by his own true calling.

As a final attempt, Aragon sent a letter to Ghostwriter lamenting the illiteracy rate of the new kingdom.

As soon as Ghostwriter saw the number, he moved his library to its new location in the Dragon Kingdom.

With the first part of his plan achieved, Aragon could move on to the second phase.

He knew that with Ghostwriter here, Samantha would be sure to visit.

Aragon had gotten wind of Samantha's recent practice of law and knew she would visit Ghostwriter's library over her own town's library because of the larger selection of books.

If everything went according to plan, Aragon would just 'happen' to stroll into the library that day (even though he had one in his own in the castle) and 'coincidentally' bump into Samantha. At that point he would invite her to dinner or to a simple excursion, most of which she turned down.

Sometimes, he would visit the human world just to see Samantha, which annoyed her to no ends.

She would be studying in her bedroom or in Danny's office, when Aragon would phase into the room uninvited and unannounced.

Once, he even phased into the room while Danny and Sam were making out, but chose not to leave, instead opting to clear his throat and announce his presence.

His sudden intrusion caused the two to scream in surprise.

It was no surprise to Aragon to see the two in such an intimate position. He knew of their relationship, but chose to ignore it.

Even after all these years of being rejected, Aragon never lost hope. He would continue to pursue the woman of his dreams regardless of the warnings Danny would give him to back off.

* * *

Speaking of bachelors, Dan was certainly living the life. Not to say he was living like a slob, but he was living without too many responsibilities.

He mostly hung around the Axion Labs building (with Dani to be more precise) and ran an occasion errand for Vlad, similar to the ones Skulker would, when he was bored.

Dan had been registered as the buildings security guard for legal purposes. At first, it had just been a title so the other human employees outside of the halfa circle could not kick him out of the building for loitering, but as the Axion Labs' success continued to grow, the GiW began to get a little suspicious of them.

Vlad had made a point of refusing to sell and ghost hunting products to them because he did not trust their judgment with the matter. He thought them to be very inexperienced, and knew of their many attempts at destroying the Ghost Zone and for that the GiW declared DALV a 'suspicious' enterprise.

Normally, this would have been a devastating blow to the DALV's many assets, but the GiW were a top secret operation. That, and the fact that people outside Amity Park did not really believe in ghosts, so word of this declaration did not go far.

Legally, the GiW could not shut down Axion Labs on those terms alone, so they had to resort to unorthodox methods.

Dan would constantly find them trying to break into the building or trying to 'inspect' shipments heading to the company, leaving Dan with no choice but to resort to unorthodox methods himself. He would give them a little ruffing, not too much, but if they caught him in a bad mood, someone might walk away with a black eye, or a broken arm.

Because of the two incredibly irritating government officials, before any tests were conducted, the entire team would have to search the building, top to bottom, for any planted bugs and cameras. They couldn't have the GiW knowing that they were cooperating with actual ghosts.

Dan's problem spread to teenagers as the experiments sometime yielded bad results.

An occasional bright, radioactive green colored explosion would emit from the building, attracting many interested teens.

Rumors soon circulated throughout the city that one could find actual ghosts in the building, leaving Dan to keep them out, but he didn't mind this.

With the teenagers he wouldn't use violence; instead, he would scare them into staying away.

He would mostly make his eyes glow an ominous red and fly towards the teens (which usually sent them packing), but on occasion, he would fire a miniature ecto-blast at their feet or over their heads.

Vlad wasn't too happy about this, but it got the job done.

When he wasn't chasing people away, Dan was either bothering Spectra or somewhere in the Ghost Zone looking for a fight.

* * *

The end of the day was Dani's favorite part.

After an exhausting day of school, they would spend about two hours working with Vlad and then head to Dan's place.

There, the teens would make dinner, eat, and socialize.

Dani loved it because it was the one time of the day where they could hang out without having to worry about anything. No ghosts, no school work, no bullies, and no having to hide her secret.

When they finished, they would clean up, Dani would see them off, and they would meet up later that night for more ghost hunting.

Some would complain that such a lifestyle would be monotonous, but Dani wouldn't have it any other way. She had spent months constantly traveling, running, wondering if she would be able to find food that night, and hated every minute of it.

This was so much better.

Staying with Dan was actually pretty nice. She took the other room in the flat, finally having a place to call her own.

Of course she was spending more time with the older ghost now, much to Danny's dismay.

It seemed like Danny had never gotten over his general dislike for his older evil self. He would constantly invite Dani to sleep over so she wouldn't have to stay with Dan.

Dani laughed his worry off.

Some things never change.

"And now, I present to you this year's graduating class." Mr. Lancer smiled as all the parents in the bleachers stood up to cheer on their children.

The graduates stood up and threw their caps into the air, joyous shrieks filling the air as they embraced their newfound freedom.

The two teenage halfas hugged in their moment of sheer elation.

* * *

**Graduation. Last year, this guy back flipped to the podium, took his diploma, and back flipped back. You should have heard how loud the audience cheered him. It's where I got the idea for Dani's little show.**

**Anyways, now that we've been caught up, the story can start! Yayz!**

**Review Please!**


	3. Decisions

**I love Anti-Cosmo.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters.**

* * *

Chapter Three: Decisions

The teens stared at Vlad as they waited for him to start speaking. They had been summoned to his office that very morning by a phone call from Spectra, not really knowing why, but complying nonetheless.

Vlad cleared his throat. "Now that all of you are adults, you need to think about your futures. As for now, you need to think about which colleges you will be attending, if you chose to do so. I say 'if you chose to do so' because I am prepared to offer you a full time position in my company. Unlike the freelance work you've done for me these past few years, you will be put on the payroll and receive the full benefits of all the DALV employees. If you choose not to go, I have a parting gift for you." Vlad took the folders he had stacked in front of him and passed them out.

The teens opened the folders. Inside, on formal business paper, was a private scholarship made out to each of them.

Everyone was surprised, but not as much as the two halfas. Hadn't they established their futures with Vlad long ago? Was this Vlad's way of asking them if they were sure?

Dani didn't really need to think about it. There wasn't much she could do anyways, seeing as she did not exist in the eyes of the government. She could try to get a job with her fake documents, but it wasn't worth the risk. She was happy where she was.

Danny on the other hand was caught in between and rock and a hard place. He wasn't too fond of business and his family wouldn't be too thrilled to hear that he was forgoing a higher education, even if it was to take over Vlad's business. He still so desperately wanted to be an astronaut, but going to college for a job he could never have seemed so pointless. It didn't look like he had much of a choice anyways. If he left, what would happen to Amity Park? He may have saved the world from destruction twice, but it didn't stop the ghosts from trying to defeat him in a power struggle for Amity Park.

"What shall it be?" Vlad's voice broke Danny out of his musings.

"I think I'll take you up on your offer." Dani closed the folder, set it down on the desk, and pushed it back to Vlad.

"Same." Danny retuned the folder.

Tucker had been thinking about this question for the past two months. Did he really want to leave Amity Park? He had gotten accepted to his dream university, MIT, and was dying to go, but on the other spectrum, could he really just leave his friends? They had been together since preschool, and now that he thought about it, he had never really had a long absence from them. It wouldn't be too bad. He could always come back and visit them during the holiday breaks. An opportunity like this didn't come by every day. He had to make the best of it.

"Thanks, Vlad. This is awesome." Tucker closed the folder and placed it in his lap.

Sam had no trouble with the decision at all. She already had her agreement with Vlad, leaving her with a pretty clear image of her future. She silently held onto the folder.

Valerie pushed the folder back to Vlad without giving it so much as a single thought. She was a ghost hunter. She hunted ghosts. Unless there was a degree in that field, she wasn't interested. Besides, she had a nice gig going here.

"Very well." Vlad placed the returned folders in his desk drawer. "It's a shame to be losing you, Tucker, but if you ever change your mind the offer will still stand."

* * *

As much as they tried putting it off, the day did come when Tucker would leave for his new life outside of Amity Park.

As a part of their farewell to Tucker, the gang joined up to help him pack up and clean out his room.

Danny picked up the last box and stored it in the overflowing trunk of the car. "You sure that's everything?"

"Yeah, thanks for the help guys." Tucker looked around him sadly, trying his best not to tear up.

"Don't sweat it, Tuck." Sam noticed the teary look in his eyes. "Like you said, you'll come back and visit us during the break."

"You bet. I'll set up the video chat on my laptop once I get there." Tucker wiped his eyes dry.

"Come on, son. It's time to go." Mr. Foley called from the driver's side of the car.

* * *

_You have received an invitation for an online chat. Will you accept?_

Danny excitedly selected the accept option while closing all his work related windows.

"Tucker!" He cried out in joy.

"What's up man?" Tucker responded in a calmer manner.

"Hold on a sec, let me call the others." Danny took the phone off the receiver, letting it automatically call Spectra. "Hey, Spectra, can you connect me to the others on the multi-line?"

…

"That's nice. Now, can you please connect me?"

…

"I don't care about how your day was. I didn't ask for you to bore me to sleep."

…

"Finally. Thank you."

…

"Guys, come to my office, Tucker is on the chat!"

Within minutes, Dani and Valerie arrived.

"Hey Tucker, settled in already?" Dani asked into the camera.

"Not really. I haven't unpacked anything yet. Say, aren't you guys short one person?" Tucker took note of the missing goth girl.

"Sam's parents are taking her out somewhere, so she won't be here for another few hours, but dude! What's your dorm like?" Danny moved out of the way so the girls could fit into the camera's view.

"It's pretty nifty. Here, I'll show you." Tucker picked up his laptop, turning it a full 180 degrees so his friends could see from the camera. "Here are the beds, this the desk, my awesome T.V, and this is the view from the window."

The teens saw a walkway with several students scurrying by in order to avoid the rain. Still seeing a window, they heard a knocking sound coming from Tucker's end of the computer.

"Hey, man. Me and my girl are going to need the room." A faint voice echoed into the microphone.

The computer was turned back to Tucker. "Sorry guys, but it looks like I have to go. Call me on the phone or something next time you have the chance."

"Will do, Tuck."

They said their good-byes and closed the chat.

* * *

Danny never realized how much he would really miss Tucker. It just wasn't the same without him.

Sure, the others were just as much fun, but they were…girls. There were just some things you couldn't do with girls. Like talk about how hot the female celebrities are, or watch action packed show over corny soap opera.

Danny tried doing some of their favorite past times alone, like hacking various websites, but found it twice as hard and half as satisfying.

Luckily, he had ghost hunting to take his mind off things for a while.

* * *

Tucker let out a sigh as he listened to his professor drone on.

Why was he even here? He knew all this stuff from working with Vlad; he wouldn't lose anything by ditching.

Seemed like everything was starting to be a real disappointment.

College was not as great an experience as he thought it would be. His two roommates were drug users and slobs, his classes were boring, and the girls were way too into their studies to give romance a second thought.

Tucker tried what dorms are well known for (the parties), but after a night of binge drinking, he learned that the agony of a hangover was not worth a night he couldn't remember or the obscenities he found drawn on his face the next morning.

Tucker returned his attention back to the lecture. Yes, he still knew all this stuff.

A feeling of nostalgia overcame him as he thought about Amity Park.

Happily, he pulled a notebook out from his backpack that Sam had given him as a parting gift. It was from their days at Casper High. Inside were lots of doodles Sam had made, including her original design for the DP logo. There were also the various conversations they had when they found themselves trapped in one of Lancer's especially boring lessons on literature.

Tucker continued to flip through the pages, chuckling as he saw Jazz' drawings of 'Ghost X'. When he reached the last page he let out a loud laugh, but quickly stopped when he noticed the entire class, professor included, staring at him.

"Sorry." He sheepishly met the gaze of the professor.

"Perhaps you should leave if you do not feel well enough to participate in the class." The professor didn't look all too happy to have his lecture interrupted.

With that, Tucker knew what he had to do.

* * *

Danny, Spectra, and Dani crowded around Vlad as they tried to make heads or tails of the program in front of them.

"What if we try this?" Dani leaned over, taking hold of the mouse and selecting a few options.

"Dani! No!" They cried in unison, but alas! It was too late.

_The program has now closed. Thank you for using Lecxe. _

"Confound this!" Vlad angrily slammed his fists against the desk.

"The dinner is tomorrow! What are we supposed to do?" Danny ran a hand through his hair out of the sheer frustration. They had a presentation to give the next day and they were short all the necessary graphs. Thanks to Dani's little stunt, they were now short an entire presentation.

"Looks like you'll have to start all over." Vlad rubbed his temples.

"You can't be serious! It's almost two in the morning, we don't have time!" Danny needed his sleep if he was going to attend his first formal presentation. Then again, he knew Vlad was right. It's not like he could walk up to the microphone and say 'Sorry folks, but we seem to be having some technical issues.'

"You don't have a choice." Spectra responded coolly. She knew panicking now would not help make another presentation. "Let's start from the beginning. Open up the outlines and run the program while I redo the math for you."

"You guys are stuck in the stone age!"

The group looked up to see Tucker standing in the doorway, a smirk on his face.

"Tucker!" they exclaimed in joy/relief.

The techno geek made his way to the computer and took control.

"This program has an auto-recovery, you should be able to pull it back up." After some fiddling, Tucker was able to bring back the presentation Dani almost deleted.

"What would I ever do without you, Tuck?" Danny was just relieved he would finally be able to get some sleep.

"This is wonderful, Tucker, but shouldn't you be at MIT?" Vlad wondered if he was the only one who found it strange that the boy was here at such an ungodly hour during a weekday.

"It was too boring for me. No ghost hunting, you know."

"Oh, really?" Danny joked.

"Yeah, really." He laughed at their inside joke. "So tell me, what's this dinner and presentation I hear about?"

"Well, apparently we'll be doing some presentation on behalf of Axion Labs about our capabilities as an Anti-Ghost facility." Dani filled him in.

"Why?"

"Ask him." The female halfa pointed to Vlad.

"As I said previously, it's a surprise." Vlad answered while scrolling through the presentation, looking mostly for mistakes or missing pieces of information.

"Where?"

"That is also a surprise. We're taking one of my private jets so be here by ten o'clock sharp! From here we'll take a limo to the airport, then take the jet." Satisfied, Vlad saved the document and closed the program. "Now, Tucker, I'll have a suit sent to your house for the occasion, but I expect you to attend. Don't think you'll wiggle out of this one."

* * *

**Well….. CAKE!**

**Review Please!**


	4. Demure

**Who else plays the flute?**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters.**

* * *

Chapter Four: Demure

"Now can we open the windows?" Dani asked impatiently.

Vlad's pilot had announced the plane's oncoming descent about an hour ago, leaving the group wonder where they were exactly.

"How much longer did the pilot say it would take?"

"Fifteen minutes."

"Alright then." Vlad rolled the window next to his seat open.

The others followed suit, watching as the ground came nearer and nearer. They saw lots of greenery, some patches of concrete, but it was the giant white building that let them know exactly where they were.

"Isn't that the white house?" Valerie pointed to the building.

"Hey, it is. Vlad, are we in D.C?" Danny turned around and called back to the older man.

"Yes." Vlad

"Wait. No. Don't tell me…" Danny felt a sense of dread creeping up on him. He sincerely hoped with all his heart he wouldn't be giving the presentation to who he thought he would be.

"Very well then, I won't tell you." Vlad chuckled at his own joke. Oh, how he enjoyed tormenting them so.

"VLAD!" The ghost hunting team cried together.

"Yes. Young Daniel here is representing the DALV industries to the president of the United States of America."

"No way! Vlad! This presentation is crap; we threw it together last night! We're going to look like idiots out there!" Danny was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Sure, Vlad had told him months ago that he would need to make this specific presentation (he still didn't tell him for what), but old habits are hard to break and the PowerPoint found itself on the bottom of Danny's priority list.

"Think of this as a lesson. Maybe next time, you won't push everything off to the last minute. Until then, it looks like you're just going to have to improvise with what you've got." The eldest halfa wasn't all that concerned. Even with Danny's poor excuse for a slideshow, they would still win the president over. Axion Labs was simply too good to be true.

"Say, why would the president be interested in this kind of stuff? I thought the government didn't endorse the supernatural world." Tucker put his seat in the upright position.

"Not in the public eye, but the GiW don't exist for nothing." Sam had actually looked this up. It's not that the GiW where classified, they were just not well-know. They became a little more well known since the Pariah's return.

The footage from the battle had been shared world-wide, leading people to question the white-suited men who were seen firing weapons at the ghost. Of course, the French government denied any factuality to the video, claiming the ghost was fictional and that an earthquake had dealt the devastating damage to the city.

"So it's the government that has samples of the ghost virus?" Dani spoke up.

"Yes. Here's the basic story." Vlad motioned to the ghost flight attendant for another drink. "After Pariah's attack, the first cases started appearing in the more cramped areas of the city. The government was called in, but they did not know how to take care of it, so they sent it to the GiW."

"Let me guess, they didn't know how to handle it either?" Danny could already feel the smirk he was going to be shooting the two white-suited agents on his way out.

"Precisely."

* * *

Dani set her bag down on the foot of the bed. She gave her room a quick look through, then, _Plop!_ She was lying face down on the bed.

This was nice! Very nice!

Alas, she couldn't relax quite yet. There were other matters at hand. Box Lunch was in Dan's care, she needed to be sure the place hadn't gone up in flames yet.

Dani pulled her cellphone out of her pocket and speed dialed home. She got her answer a few rings later.

"Hello?" It may have been Dan who answered, but it was Box Lunch's voice that could be heard babbling on.

"Hey. How is the fort holding?" She couldn't help but giggle. Dan wasn't the best when it came to children. She could only imagine how he was holding up with a chatter box like his goddaughter.

"Does this thing have an off switch? Seriously, she hasn't shut up since she got here."

"She can't be that bad. Let me talk to her, I'm sure it will help." She heard Dan pass the phone to the ghost child.

"Hi!" An excited voice rang from the other end of the line.

"Hi, sweetie. How are you?" Dani began with the customary greeting.

"I'm fine. Where are you? I'm having fun with Uncle Dan, but he's so boring! All he wants to do is watch sports. When are you coming home?" The little girl never once stopped to take a breath in between her rant.

"I'll be away for a few more days, you know that."

"Awww…"

"Don't you worry. I'll play with you as soon as I get home."

"Promise?"

"I promise. Now, be a good girl for Uncle Dan, okay?"

"Okay."

"Can you give the phone back to him?"

"Yeah. Bye-bye."

Dani heard more shuffling as the phone was transferred. "It certainly sounds like she's having fun."

"I can only imagine." Dan's response dripped with sarcasm.

"I left some leftovers in the fridge, just heat them up when she gets hungry. It won't be that long. Lunch Lady or Box Ghost should be coming over tomorrow morning to pick her up."

Dan's grumbles carried over to Dani as Box Lunch started blathering on again.

"I'll be home before you now it. If she gives you too much trouble just pop in a movie, she'll probably fall asleep mid-way through." Dani had used the tactic many times herself to get the little kids to fall asleep. For some reason, ghost children were easily lulled to sleep in front of the glowing black box. Perhaps the static? "Anyways, I'll be home before you know it."

"I'll try not to kill her, but no promises." Dan's biggest problem with the ghost children was not that they were annoying (although it was a major part of it), but that they couldn't tell the difference between 'playing' and 'avoiding being killed by ectoblasts', they just thought it was all one big game.

"Bye."

"Take care."

Dani snapped the phone shut with a sigh. She felt guilty, talking to Dan on the phone instead of face to face. With her recent graduation and this meeting, she had barely spent any time with him. It was always work, school, or with the ghost children.

Not to say she was completely ignoring him, but their intimate moments were not as often as she would have liked. Dan would sometimes join her when she was working in the lab, or come up behind her while she was combing her hair. They may not have spoken much during those times, but Dani knew Dan was not a man of many words. The silences held no air of awkwardness at all.

This did not bode over well with Sam, who was constantly trying to push Dani into a deeper relationship with Dan.

Dani knew exactly why, Clockwork had previously shown her the timeline in which she did make it past her eighteenth birthday. She had been fourteen at the time, fourteen and terrified. Had Dan really done all that? Danny had told her again and again that Dan was a crazed murder (though he eventually stopped as he got older), but seeing it for real solidified the image in Dani's mind.

Of course, the experience threw her off balance, but as Sam explained, it was in the past.

Dani remembered a few months back, when prom rolled around. She had developed into a woman, and what man could resist a beautiful woman?

Multiple guys had asked her to the prom. Dani contemplated it. What was wrong with sampling her options? She couldn't take Dan, he was Danny's mirror image as a teenager, and that would have looked creepy. Everyone would think she was at the prom with her brother.

Sam put a stop to it, by spreading a rumor that Dani was dating a boy from another school. The prospecting boys stopped asking for Dani.

It didn't take a genius to figure out who would be behind such a rumor, but Dani decided to let it go. After all, who knew how mad Dan might get if he found out? He kind of seemed like the jealous type, so she played it safe and spent the night of prom with Dan, flying through the Ghost Zone.

A knock on the door diverted Dani's attention. "Come in!"

Valerie entered the room excitedly. "Dani, have you checked out the bathroom?"

"No, not yet."

"There's a hot tub!"

"Really?" The female halfa ran to the bathroom, giving an ecstatic squeal at the sight. She looked through the large soap collection and the stack of fluffy white towels on the side. "This is amazing."

"I know, right? I'm going to go freshen up myself."

"I think I'll do the same."

* * *

After a quick dinner, the gang situated themselves in Vlad's room for one final run through of the plan.

"Go ahead, Daniel." Vlad shut the lights so the screen could be seen with ease.

Danny began giving the presentation, but Vlad's mind was elsewhere.

He thought back to the first time he let Danny handle something of the company's. Had the years really flown by?

Still, time passing was good. This event would be Axion Lab's greatest achievements.

With this, Vlad would finally be able to wipe out the other anti-ghost facilities and one-up the GiW.

And it would all go down tomorrow.

* * *

Danny felt the room suddenly get warmer. The air held way too much seriousness, and the dead silence did nothing to ease his tension.

He thought this would be like one of Vlad's lame dinner parties, but the looks of the others around him told him otherwise. He was glad to see a man walk up to the podium. It meant someone would finally break the heavy silence.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, please rise for the president of the United States of America."

Everyone stood up abruptly and broke into applause.

The president quickly strode to the podium and motioned for the people to take their seats. The man looked utterly exhausted. "Hello and thank you all for coming. As many of you know, you have been called here because we might soon find ourselves facing the biggest biological threat of the century."

The lights dimmed as the president started up his own PowerPoint. "This bacterium is called 'phasmatis', I'm sure some of you Latin speakers can see the humor in that." A low chuckle emitted from the audience.

"At first glance, it looks like other ectoplasmic bacterium, completely harmless to humans, but this one is different. This one affects humans, and the results are fatal. The origins are unknown, but our top scientists speculate that the bacteria may have simply mutated from ghosts to the point where it can thrive in the human body."

The slide changed, revealing a rather gruesome sight.

There was a woman, clearly delirious, covered in glowing green sores. Her eyes were glowing red, her bones poked through her skin, and her skin was a ghostly pale.

She looked half-dead.

"I will now turn the microphone over to Operative M of our own ghost hunting team, The Guys In White." The president took a seat in an empty chair in the row behind the podium.

"Thank you, Mr. President." The operative changed the slide. "These are the readings taken from the subject. Her vitals appear to be nonfunctioning, but as you can see, her body continues to function and she continues to breathe. The brain activity decreases sharply and the blood is slowly converted to ectoplasm until the subject dies. Upon death, the bacterium takes all remaining nutrients from the body, essentially eating it inside out."

Danny suddenly felt queasy.

"Undetectable in its early stages, the bacteria enters through pores in the skin where it works its way into the bloodstream and begins reproducing. The ectoplasm then latches on to the hemoglobin and forces the oxygen out of the cell. The body then enters a state of comatose until the bacterium finishes it off. Early symptoms begin with a high fever, vomiting, and other generic flu symptoms. What makes it difficult to discern this from a normal flu is that the symptoms are all the same until the comatose sets in a few weeks afterwards. Once the body has entered comatose, the green sores settle in."

The man changed the slide again, this time revealing a chart of the effects of various medications against the bacterium.

"All attempts at making a vaccine have failed. The bacterium mutates and becomes resistant to the medication, causing us to shut down attempts at creating the vaccine as to not make the bacterium stronger than it already is. This is why we have called you here. It is a well-known fact that everyone has few skeletons in the closet and now we trust you to pull whatever strings you have in order to stop this."

The operative stepped down, allowing the president to take microphone once more.

"We will call each company up one by one to present in the next room over."

* * *

"So what did they mean by 'skeletons in the closet'? How could the other companies have connections to the Ghost Zone?" Danny asked.

"You can't honestly expect everyone to do everything by the book. I know some of these men capture ghosts for experimentation purposes, which is clearly illegal. I doubt they have personal connections to powerful ghosts. They would have been torn to shreds for even proposing the idea of turning against their fellow ghosts." Vlad set his knife and fork down.

"That makes sense. So they've gotten that desperate?" Dani joined in.

"Did you see those pictures?" Tucker said through a mouthful of steak. "I'd be desperate to get rid of that too."

"Tucker, please." Valerie handed him a napkin, not wanting to see the contents of his mouth. "But why would the government invite all of these people? I've haven't ever heard of some of the guys here."

"Some of these people specialize in certain anti-ghost product, that's why they're not that well known. See that man over there?" Vlad pointed to a man in a black suit with a mole on the back of his neck. "He makes what you could call a 'ghost repellent.'"

"A repellent?" Dani asked skeptically.

"Yes. It's a spray with a scent that smells awful to ghosts. It has a nauseating effect on them, so the ghosts will go out of their way to avoid it. It actually works; one wiff of that stuff can even make me dizzy."

"That sounds pretty useful. I'm surprised my parents haven't thought up something like that yet." Danny turned away from the man with the mole as one of his associated pointed out the group that was staring at him.

"I'm sure they've tried. I wouldn't be surprised if some of their ghost hunting stuff has a side effect like the repellent." Sam tried to remember if any of the endless gadgets produced by the Fenton Works could do something like that. If some of the stuff could make Danny sick, she was sure it would have a more devastating effect on pure ghosts.

"Yeah, you're-" Danny stopped as he saw Vlad signal him to cut it.

An operative approached their table. "You're from Axion Labs, right?"

"Yes, that would be us." Vlad answered in a polite tone.

"It's your turn to present. Is everyone coming?"

"No, just me and my son."

The team couldn't help but snicker at the nonchalant tone Vlad used, or the look on Danny's face.

"Follow me, please." The operative led them to the other room.

"Break a leg, Danny!" Dani cried from her seat.

They broke into a full fit of laughter when the two were out of sight.

* * *

**Mango milkshake is amazing. Seriously, you guys have to try it!**

**So, we're finally making progress (hopefully). I don't know if that's actually what the rooms in the white house look like. I've never been inside, so just work with me.**

**Review Please!**


	5. Birthday Celebrations

**Listen to your heartbeat!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters. **

* * *

Chapter Five: Birthday Celebrations

"Vlad, I thought we agreed. No parties!" Dani pulled at the stiff collar of her dress. The thing was practically suffocating her.

"Relax, both of you. This isn't for you." Vlad continued ushering the two forward to the front door.

"Oh yeah?" Danny raised an eyebrow. "What else could you be celebrating on the day of our birthday?"

"I already told you, we're celebrating your victory at the white house. Why can't you just believe me?" The eldest halfa questioned innocently.

It was true. Despite Danny's nerves; he was able to give a halfway decent presentation to the president and his cabinet. There had been much celebrating in Dan's condo that night. And much cleaning up afterwards.

"Maybe it's because your story is ridiculous, Vlad." Dani hated the man's social parties more than anything else. It was a bunch of old people telling jokes that weren't even funny. The only reason she came was for the food.

"Nonsense." Vlad opened the door, revealing the scene the two halfas had been dreading.

There was a huge banner across the room saying 'Happy Birthday', a giant cake in the center, and many of Vlad's business buddies.

"Vlad…" Dani growled through her clenched teeth. This is not how she wanted to spend her birthday.

"Happy birthday." Vlad smiled and pushed the two of them into the room.

* * *

"Eighteen is such an important time for a teenager." An old woman blathered on to Danny, who was not really listening, just nodding here and there to give the illusion that he was doing so.

Vlad had told him that this would be a great time for him and Dani to make their formal debut as Vlad's successors, but he really couldn't care, neither did he know if he could handle it much longer. He could have sworn he saw the clock move a minute back.

It was their birthday, their eighteenth birthday (at least for him). It would be Dani's sweet sixteen, yet here she was.

From the looks of it, she wasn't having a great time either. There was some creepy old man, apparently a big-shot in the IT industry, who wouldn't stop hitting on her. Vlad would normally come in and save her from such situations, but with almost every millionaire and billionaire in the world there, he had his hands too tied up to notice.

Danny groaned inwardly as another man joined his table and started rambling to him about the responsibilities of being an adult. He was so bored! He suddenly regretted telling the others not to come.

Out of the kindness of his heart, Danny didn't invite any of their friends, not wanting to bore them out of their minds either. They had all decided to celebrate later with dinner and a possible trip to the local amusement park.

He told Vlad multiple times he didn't want a party! Why couldn't the man just listen? Oh, right, because he was a fruitloop.

His watch told him it was almost ten. He could slip out now and no one would notice.

Danny silently willed forward an invisible duplicate (a little trick he learned from Dan) and sent it to the female halfa across the room. It quickly whispered something into her ear before returning to Danny.

When Danny saw her excuse herself he prepared to take his own leave.

"Excuse me; I just need to use the restroom." Danny left the table made his way to the boy's bathroom. He quickly pulled out his cell phone, sent a text to Sam and Tucker, and went ghost. He promptly turned intangible and flew through the roof, where Dani stood, also in ghost form, waiting for him.

"Are we bailing?" She asked with a smile.

"You bet. First thing first." Danny took his cell phone and threw it as far as he could into the distance. "Don't want the fruitloop tracking us through these."

Dani laughed as she followed suit. "Right, because using ghost powers to find someone is so overrated."

Danny ignored her comment and took off.

* * *

"You guys sure it's such a great idea to ditch Vlad? He did say this was going to be your formal introduction party." Sam threw her pillow across the room at Danny.

"Sure! What's the worst he could do?" Dani lay sprawled on the bed next to Sam.

"He'd just yell at us. Besides, he's probably already come up with an excuse as to why we aren't at the party anymore." Danny caught the pillow and threw it to Tucker.

"So, it is your guys' birthday. Where do you want to go?" Sam flipped onto her stomach. They were certainly not going to spend their birthday in her bedroom.

"Think. We need someplace we can trash, but that no one can intrude on." Dani responded.

There was a moment of silence.

Then, elation.

* * *

Danny put his hand up against the wall. "You ready?" He called back to Dan.

Dan waved to him. "Ready!"

"Fire!"

Dan's hand lit up with red ectoplasm. He swiped the energy underneath the wicks and covered his ears as the fireworks began sparking.

Danny turned the wall intangible and ducked to the ground.

The fireworks flew across the room, past the teens, over Danny's head, through the intangible wall, and into the night, where they finally detonated into an explosion of color.

They all cheered as the wall lost its intangibility and solidified once more.

"See, I told you this was the best place." Danny proclaimed proudly.

The teens decided they wanted to celebrate with some fireworks they picked up from downtown, but didn't have any place to launch them. They could have gone to the outskirts of the city and launched them there, but they knew the police would follow the light show and quickly put an end to it.

Danny came up with the idea of launching them indoors, which was immediately met with resistance from everyone in the group. Sam added on the idea of launching them indoors through an intangible wall so the cops couldn't get them, and they could celebrate.

It was prefect! The cops did come by, but when the found no evidence of a launch anywhere outside the building, they left.

Dan joined the group when he saw the fireworks going off by the labs, thinking it was some teenagers trying to break in again, but stayed when Dani asked him to. He was put in charge of lighting the fireworks when they discovered that the red ectoplasm would make the explosion bigger and brighter than a normal match would.

"Last one." Dan announced as he positioned the explosive.

Danny stood up once more, giving a thumbs up to Dan.

Dan lit the firework and watched it go.

Danny did the most peculiar thing, or stupid, depending on how much you enjoyed near death experiences.

Rather than turn the wall intangible, he simply ducked down and put his hands over his head.

The firework ricocheted off the wall, heading straight for the table the others were sitting on. They jumped off the table as fast as they could, landing messily onto the floor. The firework continued to bounce off the walls until the wick ran out and it exploded, destroying a few file cabinets in its wake.

"Danny!" They cried in unison.

"What were you thinking? Have you lost finally lost it?" Valerie yelled at him. She put her hand over her heart trying to calm the feverish beating down.

"Chill out guys. It's just a little rush." He smirked at their faces of worry, his own heart pounding against his ribcage from the adrenaline rush.

"A rush! All this for a rush! How are we supposed to explain this?" Dani pointed to the scorch marks across the room and the remains of what was once a row of file cabinets. "Vlad is going to be so pissed! There could have been some really important documents in there!"

"We're trying to celebrate here! Remember?" Danny didn't see what the big deal was. Vlad could easily pay to have the lab fixed, and those paper documents were probably backed up on one of the computers here. Why were they panicking so much?

"Well, you destroyed the place? How are we supposed to celebrate here?" Valerie ran her hand over a scorch mark on one of the tables. Yup, that thing was destined for the dump.

"Okay, okay, I have a better idea. We can still celebrate, just not here." Tucker picked himself up and dusted himself off. "We're all eighteen now, right?"

"I think we've established that many times." Sam remarked as joined Valerie in examining the remains of the furniture and equipment.

"Why don't we go clubbing?" He cheerily asked.

"Because that's also a bad idea." Dani had heard so many stories about things going wrong at clubs. She really did not want to go. Those places were filled with drugs and strippers. What fun could they possibly get out of that?

"That's a great idea!" Danny grabbed Sam's arm. He wouldn't mind doing a little dancing, perhaps even getting to try his first drink before the age of twenty one. "Let's go!" He pulled her outside. Valerie didn't have anything better to do, so she followed reluctantly behind him and Tucker.

Dani turned to Dan. "You're the adult here, aren't you going to stop them?"

"Did I stop you guys when I caught you lighting fireworks indoors?" He asked her with a smirk.

"No."

"Let's get going then."

* * *

Dan leaned against the bar, drink in hand, watching the dance floor. It actually wasn't all that bad an idea to come here. He had drinks he could want and he got to watch his younger counterpart make a fool of himself on the dance floor.

The kid was just way too excited about becoming an adult.

It wasn't even all that great. When you turn eighteen you could get sued, kicked out of your house by your parents, be charged for crimes as an adult, and people expect you to act mature. As if age had something to do with how mature a person was.

By the time he was eighteen, Dan had already destroyed most of human civilization.

In a weird way, he kind of missed those days of senseless violence. He missed the fear in people's eyes whenever they saw him approaching. He missed the screams that would ensue when he started attacking.

Dan absentmindedly swirled his drink around, breaking from his trance when he felt it being pulled from his hands. "May I ask what you're doing?" Dan watched as Dani downed his drink. Good thing he hadn't been in the mood for alcohol.

"No, you may not." She slammed the cup down on the bar and pulled Dan out of his seat. "I do believe you owe me a night of dancing."

It was true. With Dan not being able to go to prom with her, he still owed her a night of dancing.

Dan couldn't help but chuckle at the younger girl. She had hit her growth spurt a year ago, but she still barely reached his shoulders.

Dani stopped as Dan continued to laugh. "Come on! I'm serious!"

"Alright, alright." Dan grabbed Dani.

The night began.

* * *

After a few hours (when Danny could no longer keep his eyes open), the group dispersed, headed for home.

Most of them headed home, Dan and Dani decided to prolong their night with a quick flight through the city. It started with the intention to go home, but turned into a race, then turned into a competition, but now it was just flying for the sake of it (yet the competition to see who could go faster had not ended).

Dani flew faster than she ever had before. The trees were blurring by in green masses, rustling heavily as she sped by. The cold night air stung her face as her hair was pulled back by the wind.

Suddenly, a blue light shot right past her with an echoing laugh.

The white-haired girl immediately channeled all her remaining energy into her feet, propelling her forward in a sudden burst. Straining herself, she managed to get eye to eye with Dan. With a smirk, she threw herself to the right, knocking Dan off balance. Her plan might have worked had he not grabbed her leg at the last minute, dragging her down with him.

They tumbled through the trees, landing in a heap on the forest floor. They laid there for a while, gasping as they tried to catch their breath.

Just the two of them staring into the vastness of space.

"Thanks for tonight, Dan." Dani closed the door to the flat behind her. "You're not one for our stupid plans, why did you come along?"

"It is your special day. How could I say no?" Dan put his arm around her waist and pulled her closer to him.

Within moments, the two were exchanging a heated kiss.

Dani knew exactly what she wanted to do. True, she may have been young, but she felt, she knew she was ready. She had spent four years with Dan; there would never be anyone better for her.

She ran her hands up his chest, giving him the okay to continue.

They stumbled around for a bit until they found Dan's bedroom.

The door closed as the two continued.

* * *

**Let's give the couple their privacy. ;)**

**(Don't say I didn't warn you, because I most certainly did in the first chapter.)**

**So…this is sufficiently awkward. **

**Review Please!**


	6. Disaster

"**We can't send him to his home planet to be killed, or worse, married!" – Cosmo (The Fairly OddParents)**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters.**

**

* * *

**

Chapter Six: Discoveries

"What on earth were you thinking?" Vlad yelled for the hundredth time. "The entire laboratory was destroyed! What in the name of all that is evil was running through your mind? What exactly?"

As one could have imagined, Vlad didn't take to well to seeing his laboratory in ashes and most of his equipment in piles of shattered glass.

"I understand you wanted to celebrate, but fireworks indoors? Isn't that a little too rash, even for an unruly group such as yourselves? You should have been more responsible, or at least a little more intelligent." Vlad eyed the group with irritation clearly written on his face. Money wasn't an issue, but replacing everything in the lab would be time consuming. He would have to ask to borrow some of Spectra's equipment. Again. Couldn't they go a few months without completely tearing down his facility and/or office?

The teens (minus the female halfa) on the other hand were totally prepared for this speech. They knew it was inevitable, but it was still weird. They did their best not to make eye contact with Vlad as he yelled at them. Being friends, they stuck together, which meant not ratting Danny out for his little stunt. Of course, Danny would be paying for it later when they stuffed themselves at the Nasty Burger and the bill would be passed to him.

Vlad finally stopped and ran a hand through his silver hair. "You are all going to march to the lab, clean up the mess you made, reorganize the cabinets, and sort all the loose papers from the file cabinets!" He pointed to the door. "Go!"

* * *

"I'm surprised. We got off a lot easier than I thought we would." Sam swept up what appeared to be the remains of a beaker.

"Says you!" Danny lamented. "He'll be piling the paper work on my desk for the next months. I can already feel the weight of them on my desk."

"Sucks to be you! I don't have any paperwork!" Tucker bragged. All his work was mostly hands-on; he didn't handle any of the financing or stuff like that.

"Well if were suffering, at least we're all suffering together." Sam referred to them being forced to clean the lab. "And we'll all be having a wonderful dinner tonight."

"Speaking of together, where is Dani?" Valerie called out from the file cabinet she was sorting through.

"I don't know. Call Spectra at the front desk, she would probably know." Danny threw one of the office phones at Valerie. "Think fast!"

She saw it coming, reacting quickly, and caught it in an awkward fashion. Good thing all that ghost hunting helped hone her reflexes. "Hey! I think you've done enough damage for a long time, do not throw stuff around like that." She dialed the numbers for the front office. "Hello, Spectra. Do you know where Dani is?" She put the phone on speaker, so she wouldn't have to retell the information to everyone.

"Dani called in sick." Spectra's bored voice explained.

"No way. That's too convenient." Sam laughed at the excuse. "I bet she called in sick so she wouldn't have to deal with any of this."

"Well, just between us girls, it wasn't Dani who called in, it was Dan."

"Dan?" Valerie and Sam asked at the same time.

"Yeah. He said she was feeling a little 'sore' if you get his drift." Spectra gave a short laugh. How she loved thing kind of juicy gossip. She knew it was only a matter of time before Dan and Dani had a go. Looks like she had been right.

"What?" Danny dropped the stack of papers he was holding.

"Am I on speaker phone?" Spectra asked nervously.

"..yes." Valerie responded, just as nervous.

"Dani's going to be pissed!" Spectra couldn't help but face palm herself. If only she wasn't such of a sucker for juicy gossip.

Sam quickly took the phone off speaker and brought the receiver to her mouth. "Don't worry, I'll handle this."

"That man of yours is kind of entertaining."

"Yeah. You say that only because you're not the one who is going to have to talk him out of doing something stupid." Sam quickly hung up without a goodbye when she saw Danny storm out of the room. She quickly chased after him, grabbing a hold of his arm. "Danny, why don't you calm down for a second and think this over a bit?"

"Calm down!" Danny pulled away. "Dan, he-he- that no good bastard! Dani's too young for something like that!"

"Danny, please." Sam gave him her best puppy-eyes, eventually winning him over. "I think Dani's old enough to be making these types of decision for herself. After all, we were the same age when we first did the same."

"We knew what we were doing!"

"You're saying she doesn't?"

"Exactly!"

Sam sighed. Sometimes she wished Danny could hear how illogical he sounded. "Look, Danny, this is an extremely personal decision for women. You can't just walk up to Dani and start berating her about it. She might genuinely come to hate you for it."

Danny let out his own sigh of frustration. Deep inside, he knew Sam was alright. She always was. "Fine, fine, but you have to promise me you'll talk to her about it."

"I will, but don't think that I'll be trying to talk her out of it."

Danny grumbled.

* * *

Dani yawned as she fished around the fridge, pulling out ingredients for breakfast.

Eggs, bread, juice, all the usual.

She couldn't help but smile as she remembered that morning. She had woken up wrapped his Dan's muscular arms. It was paradise. It was cut short when she realized what time it was, but Dan already told her that he called her in sick.

Dani figured she would go to work anyways. She really wanted to have a look at the new bacteria they got. She quickly made breakfast, burning part of it in her thoughts. She examined the black spots on the eggs. Oh well, maybe next time. She threw the burned eggs into the garbage can and pulled out a box of cereal from the cupboard. "Dan! Breakfast!"

Dan finished drying off his human hair. It was too troublesome to bathe as a ghost, seeing as his hair was mostly fire, so he preferred doing so in his human form. He headed for the kitchen. "Good morning." He pulled Dani into another passionate kiss.

"I decided I'm going to go to work anyways. I really want to check that specimen out." Dani took some bowl out of another cupboard.

Dan sniffed the air for a moment. "Did you burn something?"

"No!"

* * *

"Come on, Dani!" Dan called from the doorway. Girls! They took forever to get ready!

"I'm coming, I'm coming!" She called back from somewhere in her room.

Dan sighed as he waited. He would wait forever for Dani. He never thought he would still manage to end up with Dani after watching past Valerie pull the trigger right through her heart. When he first saw Dani all those years ago when he busted out of the thermos, he thought for sure Clockwork was playing some kind of a sick joke on him. It would be so like that ghost to do that just for kicks. Just the thought of that ghost was making him angry.

What did it matter?

He had Dani now, and that was all he wanted.

"Come on, Dani! I'm leaving without you!" He yelled once more.

"I'm here!" Dani ran out of her room and clumsily tripped.

Dan watched in amusement as she quickly slipped her shoes on and picked herself up.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Thanks for asking." She straightened out her outfit.

Dan laughed at her statement. "Let's go."

* * *

Dani put on her lab coat and goggles, joining Spectra in the makeshift lab they constructed due to the actual one being in shambles. "Are you looking at the new bacteria?"

"Yeah. You should really check this out." Spectra turned the microscope's viewing lense to Dani.

The bacteria swan around, giving off an eerie green glow. There were a few cells, but they stretched themselves out on in, as if trying to make themselves look bigger.

"Why are there so few?" Dani continued adjusting the knobs on the microscope, trying to get a better look at the nucleus.

"They probably think we can't handle it." Spectra scoffed as the two operatives came to mind. "Just grow it in a culture."

Dani prepared a petri dish, but stopped when she realized she was missing a crucial ingredient. "What am I supposed to feed ectoplasmic bacteria?"

"Well, it attacks humans, so try swabbing some of your skin cells."

Dani rolled a q-tip around the inside of her cheek for a little and then wiped it onto the petri dish. "There you go little guy." She spoke to the bacteria as she scraped it into the dish.

* * *

Danny typed on his laptop at a furious pace.

Sam had recently informed him that she was going to 'wait it out' before approaching Dani.

Wait for what? The apocalypse? Couldn't she see that this was urgent?

It just didn't make any sense to him. Why would Dan call Dani in sick? If it was to just be lazy, Dani would have done it herself (laughing the entire time to Spectra about it).

What if…Dan had forced himself on her?

Danny slammed his laptop shut rather loudly, startling Vlad as he walked in the room. He wordlessly got up and stormed past the middle aged man, ignoring the look of surprise on his face.

* * *

Dani carefully measured one thousand pikoliters of saturated liquid into the bacteria culture.

The bacteria did not take accept her cells as food, opting to just float next to them rather than consume them, leaving her to use normal sugar as food.

This had to be the most interesting specimen she had ever seen before. It was like it picked and chose what it wanted to do and eat. Most bacteria just followed instincts and drifted to the nearest source of food and energy. This one almost seemed like it had a brain. It could tell when Dani was going to expose it to something dangerous (it would shrink up to protect itself) and it could tell when she was going to expose it to something nice (it would expand and absorb as much of it as it could.)

Dani picked up the petri dish and held it up to the light. Would that have an effect on it too?

Her motions were stopped by the slamming of the door. In the doorway stood her brother, a neutral look in his eye. "Danny, is something wrong?" She warily eyed him.

"No." Danny took a deep breath as his senses suddenly returned to him. "I came for some papers." He moved a stack of lab supplies to reach a file cabinet. He fished around, trying to look convincing. He figured he could just observe Dani for signs of emotional trauma.

Dani eyed her brother suspiciously. There was no way he came here for 'papers'. He was going through an empty file cabinet for crying out loud! Still, she chose to ignore him, even if he did look like he had a rock stuck on the inside of his shoe.

She sighed. Of course. Danny probably knew.

His outburst to come would only prove her suspicions.

"Why Dani! Why?" Danny screamed.

"Excuse me?" She might as well play it out for as long as she could. She brought the dish down, setting it on the counter.

"You know what I'm talking about!"

"Well then, you probably already know my answer."

"Just answer me, did Dan force you to?"

"No. It was my own decision."

"Well it was a very bad one at that."

"I think I can judge for myself, thank you very much."

"Dani! This is serious!"

"I am being serious. I seriously think you should butt out of my romantic life!"

Something about the way she said it made Danny realize that what Sam said was true. Dani may really never forgive him if he screwed this up. He couldn't help it! This was his sister! He just wanted to be sure. "Alright. I'm sorry. Just promise me you'll be careful."

"You're not about to give me the 'talk' are you?" She almost laughed as she said this. Wouldn't that be a sight!

"No. Just…you know…safety is good." Danny picked up the petri dish in his attempt to stave off making eye contact with the younger girl. "I swear if anything happens…I'll…I'll do this to Dan!" Danny crushed the petri dish in his hand.

Danny may not have known what was in the dish, but Dani did.

And she screamed.

* * *

**Calm down guys, this is the crisis point, not the plot. My main plot point has nothing to do with the bacteria so don't get your panties in a bunch. **

**On a totally separate note, I need a beta. If anyone is interested you could PM me or tell me in a review. **

**Review Please!**


	7. Desperate Plea

**Rain! Yes!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters.**

* * *

Chapter Seven: Desperate Plea

Everyone crowded around Spectra as she examined a sample of Danny's blood.

Luckily, if he did contract the bacteria, it wouldn't be contagious yet, thereby allowing Danny to be one of the people hovering over her shoulder.

"So, what is it?" Danny asked rather nervously.

Spectra continued looking at the sample for a moment. "I have some bad news for you."

Danny stared, mouth agape in shock. The images from the slideshow flashed through his mind. A sudden wave of nausea hit him. He grabbed his stomach and emptied its contents.

"Danny!" Everyone cried out, hovering over him to make sure he was okay.

Sam quickly pulled his arm over her shoulder and helped him into a chair. "Danny, are you alright?"

"Yeah. It just got me by surprise, that's all."

Vlad rubbed his own brow. "Oh, Little Badger."

* * *

Vlad wasted no time at all.

He made arrangements to send Dani and Spectra to the Ghost Zone in hopes of collaborating with the medics in Aragon's kingdom to find a cure. They may not be full on doctors like Spectra and Bertrand, but they might still be of some use. He sent Dan and Skulker out to get samples of various herbs and funguses growing in the depths of the glowing green world. Among the thousands of undocumented specimens there had to be something that would help.

He also had some under-the-table interactions set up. For one, he secured a place in the Far Frozen to put Danny in quarantine should the boy's final days come about. It wouldn't be fair to Danny to keep him alone in his dying moments, but that would the time when he would be most contagious. If this spread out of control, unwanted fingers would be pointed at them. Vlad prayed it would never come to that. He had informed Frostbite of Danny's condition, asking him to keep the information a secret. It would be disastrous if the Ghost Zone was to get word of Danny's condition.

Frostbite agreed. He was concerned about Danny's wellbeing (as he was the Ghost Zone's savior), but only consented to keeping the information from him because it would be for the better good.

Vlad even tried coming up with a cure himself in his personal lab, but nothing seemed to bother the bacteria. It just floated on in its petri dish.

When there was nothing more he himself could do, he simply waited.

It was all up to the others now.

* * *

"Aragon, with all due respect, you're being ridiculous!" Spectra cried out as the dragon ghost denied their request to collaborate with the medics.

"I am terribly sorry, but I cannot allow you to enter. I did not know the nature of your medicinal research when Plasmius sent me the request." Aragon's cool never left him, even through the girls' yelling.

"Look, we just plan to compare data. We didn't bring the bacteria with us! You act as if we have no idea as to what we're doing. I think you forget of my centuries spent in this business." Spectra was starting to lose her temper.

"As I previously stated, I cannot allow you to enter. I was under the impression that you had this contained, but when I received word of young Phantom contracting the sickness my mind was suddenly changed. I must put my subjects before anything else, even before myself. For all I know, you two might be unknowingly carrying traces of the bacteria on your person right now!"

"He's going to die!" Dani grabbed the front of his tunic, knowing it was an incredibly risky move. Aragon's temper was infamous; she would not have been the first one to walk away missing a limb when angering the king. "Can you live with that on your conscious?"

Aragon must have been in a very good mood. He gently pried her fingers off his shirt using the least amount of force needed. "If it means keeping the rest of my kingdom safe, then yes, I can."

Dani stared at him with pleading eyes. When the man did not change his mind she wordlessly left, slamming the door loudly behind her.

Spectra gave Aragon a glare before joining her.

* * *

Dani stormed down the halls of the castle, not really knowing where she was going. Most of her time spent in the kingdom was within the actual city itself, not within the castle walls although she did enter for special occasions or visiting Dora.

She tried several rooms, always slamming the doors closed when it turned out to be the wrong one. She opened an ornately decorated door, slamming it when she found a bedroom inhabited by some blonde haired ghost, but no way out.

Wait. Blonde haired ghost?

Dani opened the door once more and looked inside. She found Dora staring at her from her study in shock. "I'm sorry. I'm just trying to find my way out of here." She rubbed the back of her head in embarrassment.

Dora laughed. "Have you really been searching for so long as to lose your patience?"

Dani nodded, red rushing to her cheeks as she felt a blush coming on. She looked like an idiot in front of the princess.

"I shall lead you outside. Tell me, friend, what brings you here?" Dora took Dani's arm and linked it in hers.

Dani explained the situation to the female dragon ghost as she led her down the halls to the front of the castle, her voice spiking in anger when she retold Aragon's decision.

"No. My brother would do no such thing." Dora stated in disbelief. Aragon couldn't be that heartless.

"I'm leaving without anything that could help Danny." Dani help up her empty palms.

"I assure you Aragon will come around. If need be you can send Samantha over to convince him. You know how he can't say no to her."

"That's true. I guess Aragon was just trying to put on a show."

"Do not worry. If worse comes to worse we can always sneak you in here." Dora winked at her.

Dani laughed, but stopped when she remembered something. "Crap! Spectra is still here! We have to find her." She ran off in a random direction.

Dora couldn't help but laugh as she chased after the white-haired ghost girl through the halls.

* * *

Aragon looked out his window as he heard the doors slamming. That girl really did know how to create a ruckus.

Regardless, he just might be able to make this work in his favor. If Danny Phantom really did contract this fatal bacteria, he would be out of his hair for good.

Sam would be as good as his.

It may have been cruel, but Aragon could not stand it. Why couldn't that woman see how much he loved her? It's not like he had been keeping it a secret this entire time. According to Dora, the goth girl had spent years throwing subtle hints at Danny, who did not pick up even one! He only figured it out when they confessed.

He was better for Sam. The only thing Danny was good at was making enemies of the ghosts in the Ghost Zone. Didn't he see how much this put Sam in danger? What if an enemy decided to take her hostage, or worse, kill her in an act of revenge? Again and again, he told himself he would kill Danny if he ever allowed something like that to happen to her.

He could also better protect her. He could give her a stable life. He could give her riches beyond her imagination.

Yet, she still chooses that blasted half-breed!

Aragon narrowed his eyes at the window when he saw his two unwanted guests exit his castle. If indirectly killing Danny was the only way to get the woman he loved, so be it.

He would do everything in his power to make sure the girl halfa never got a hold of the information she needed to save her brother.

* * *

"Really? He just said no like that?" Dan watched Dani pace back and forth across the office.

"Yeah! He was like 'oh, you'll get everyone else sick' and wouldn't let us through. We need to see what those other ghosts found!" She ran her hand through her hair for the hundredth time that night. It was all she could do to reign in her anger and frustration.

"How about I go rough him up a bit? You know, 'convince' him to giving us the information." Dan smirked at his own suggestion. He knew he could beat the Dragon King with his eyes closed. Everyone knew dragons were sensitive to sound; one ghostly wail would be enough to take him out.

"Nothing that would launch a war, please." Vlad spoke up without even looking from his computer. He wasn't too worried because he mostly knew the kind of show Aragon had to put up for his kingdom. He sometimes had to put on elaborate shows himself, when in reality he could have taken what he wanted instantaneously. Aragon would probably call them in the next two or three days to come over and gather what they needed. "Calm down. You know the drill when it comes to this sort of thing."

"I know, I know. I can't help but be nervous. What if something goes wrong? What if Danny gets sicker earlier because he's half-ghost or something?"

"Don't jinx it. Just relax. If anything goes wrong, I'm sure Aragon will take Daniel in right away. Even if he doesn't we still have our own lab." Vlad closed his computer and got up. "I need to go check on Daniel. If you need me I'll be in the medical ward." He stopped just as he was halfway out the door. "Dan, please take your feet off the table. I don't want your shoes mucking up the glass."

Dan rolled his eyes, but obliged anyways.

Dani continued to pace around at a more frantic rate.

"If you keep walking around you'll burn a hole in the carpet."

Dani stopped and sighed. The two of them were right. She was worrying over nothing. After all, Dan and Skulker had returned with lots of specimens to try against the bacteria. Spectra was an experienced doctor, she would come up with something.

"Come here." Dan motioned her over and pulled her into his lap. He started rubbing her shoulders, feeling the tension in between her shoulder blades ease up considerably.

"Thanks, Dan. This is just what I needed."

* * *

Danny spun Sam around as they danced to the classical music in the background. Danny had been confined to the medical ward of the building, but that didn't stop him from having some fun.

They found some of Vlad's classical music CDs lying around and decided to put them to good use.

Their little soiree might have gone on for a bit had Vlad not entered upon the scene.

"Daniel, I thought I told you not to get out of bed." Vlad's stern voice held no air of whimsy to it.

Danny sighed as he stopped his dancing and returned to the white-sheeted bed.

Sam pulled up a stool next to him, giving him an apologetic smile all the while.

"Is this really necessary? I thought the symptoms won't start showing for another few days. Even then, won't we have the fever as a warning?" Danny grudgingly lay down.

"The infection passes through the bloodstream and moving around makes your blood pump faster. We might be able to delay the infection, but your constantly getting up and moving around doesn't help." Vlad pulled a sterilized needle from a nearby cabinet.

Sam looked away when he drew blood from Danny's arm. She had trouble seeing blood. Just one of the many reasons she was an ultra-recyclo vegetarian.

Vlad removed the needle and placed the vial with Danny's blood in his coat pocket to be examined later. He then began the normal standard of taking Danny's blood pressure, heart rate, and temperature. "Everything seems to be fine at the moment."

Danny rolled his eyes. "You don't say."

Vlad's face fell a bit at the boy's lax nature. How could he be so calm at a time like this? At least he wasn't having multiple panic attacks; that would send his blood pressure through the roof.

Sam continued rubbing Danny's hand in silence. It was these intimate moments she loved the most, even if there was someone else in the room.

Danny smiled at her and gave a contented sigh. "You know, I was thinking…maybe it's about time I told my parents."

Sam's ministrations came to a halt. He couldn't. She thought over everything that could go wrong, everything that would come with this confession. There were thousands of ways it could go wrong, but only one way in which it could go right.

"You can't be serious, Little Badger." Vlad looked up from the blood sample. "Perhaps you should wait until we know for sure whether you will be contracting this sickness."

"That's not the reason! It's been four years since the accident, four years since I got my powers, and four years since Danny Phantom appeared. My mom is going to figure it out eventually, I might as well tell her."

Sam couldn't help but notice he didn't mention anything about his father noticing. "Danny, what if they don't take it the right way? What if they only see you as a ghost, not as their son?"

Danny didn't say anything. He stared at the ceiling as his mind ran around in circles. He thought about this multiple times. What if his parents really tried to kill him? Not like when they fired shots from their bedroom window, but genuinely wanted to strap him to a table and disintegrate him 'molecule by molecule'.

"If they kick you out, you're welcome to come stay with me." Vlad tossed in, a smile on his face.

"Wow, thanks fruitloop. Nice to know you'll always take advantage of the situation." That took care of that problem, but still. Danny had to, needed to, know if his parents would really accept him for who he was, even if half of him was everything they hated.

"Well, if you decide to do it, I'll be with you, right here." Sam patted his arm.

Danny grabbed her arm, pulling her down into a kiss.

Vlad looked down, pretending not to notice.

* * *

"So how is he doing?" Desiree watched Danny and Sam form the tinted glass outside.

"Well, he hasn't started showing any signs, so fine for now." Dani said from her spot on the steel table.

"Mommy, can I go see Auntie Sam and Uncle Danny?" Viki squirmed excitedly in her mother's lap. She didn't get a chance to see them the last time she was here (they were in D.C at the time), and really wanted to play.

"No, dear. Danny's not feeling too well." Ember set her daughter down so she could run up and press her face against the glass.

"Ewww!" The little girl cried out when she saw the teen couple kiss.

"Hey, why don't you give us a little show?" Spectra knocked loudly on the glass causing the two to break away in surprise.

They girls all laughed at their embarrassed look.

* * *

**Crappy incense is very crappy. My house smells like burning paper. **

**Review Please!**


	8. The Truth

**I am nobody. Nobody is perfect. Therefore, I am perfect. Your argument is invalid.**

**Uploading this a bit early because I won't be able to tomorrow morning. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters.**

* * *

Chapter Eight: The Truth

"Danny!" Sam pulled her hand away from his forehead. "You're burning up! Hold on, I'll be right back." She ran out of the medical wing and into the halls. She ran up a flight of stairs, sliding to a halt in front of an intricately decorated door. She slammed the door open, giving a shock to the men inside.

Vlad, all too used to having teens barge in unannounced, did not react, but the two other men Vlad was conversing with almost jumped out of their skins.

"Samantha!" Vlad snapped angrily. "I am in the middle of something right now. I would appreciate it if you knocked first."

"It's Danny." She took deep breaths, ignoring the burning feeling in her lungs. Why was Vlad's building so big? "He's at one hundred three degrees."

Vlad stood up and threw all the papers on his desk in the drawer with one swift motion. "I am so sorry, gentlemen, but it looks like we will have to reschedule." He frantically ushered the other business men out of the office. "Samantha, can you see these two off please?" He bounded down the hall, not waiting for her response.

Sam evened out her breathing to look slightly more presentable. As much as she wanted to rejoin Danny, these guys would have to go first. If they got too nosy, it might be hard to keep Danny's sickness a secret. "Right this way, gentlemen."

* * *

Spectra and Vlad each monitored something else on Danny. Spectra was taking his blood pressure, which had dropped considerably, and Vlad worked on lowering Danny's temperature.

Danny stared up at the two through his delirious haze, their white medical masks a reminder of his predicament. He turned to the window where he saw Sam and Dani, faces full of worry. They had been forced to stay outside as not to catch the bacteria. No one knew how it was contagious person-to-person, so Vlad made them stay outside just in case.

"Daniel, how are you feeling?" Vlad pressed an ice pack against Danny's forehead.

"Dizzy." The ill teenager watched as Vlad faded in and out of focus.

"I can imagine with all these little buggers passing through your brain. Vlad, come see this." Spectra showed him the sample.

The bacteria split so slowly, ten minutes passed by the time the bacteria had finally made its first copy.

"This explains why we have a few weeks, but the bacteria works by forcing the body to rejects nutrients. We need to find a way to keep Danny hydrated." Spectra typed furiously into the computer, generating the special combination of nutrients for Danny's IV.

"Maybe there is a way around it. Daniel here is half ghost, what if his body could survive on ghost nutrients?" Vlad recalled the few times he relied on glowing green vegetation in the Ghost Zone for his own survival. That was a long time ago, when he had to fight to establish his name. Now, his very presence instilled fear in weaker ghosts.

"It might, but he's still half human. If we don't properly nourish both halves, he will still get overtaken by the bacteria." Spectra had seen what happens to ghosts who didn't get their spectral nourishment. It usually only occurred to ghosts who spent too much time in the human world. Ghosts absorbed the nutrients from the Ghost Zone directly through their skin, causing eating to become a hobby, not a necessity. "Still, I'll program the nutrients in. We might be able to keep him conscious for an extra week or two."

"Daniel, look at me." Vlad patted Danny's cheeks, rousing him from his almost sleep. "I need you to go ghost. Can you do that for me?"

Danny closed his eyes and willed his alter ego forward. It proved to be too much for him and he passed out.

"Penelope, any day now!" Vlad called.

Spectra picked up her pace a bit. Vlad only called her by her first name when he was serious. She took the clear bag and hooked it to an IV stand before rolling it over to Danny's bed. She quickly swabbed his arm with alcohol and inserted the needle.

The two adults stood over the unconscious ghost boy. What more could they do? None of the Ghost Zone's specimens had any effect on the strange bacteria. The only thing they could do was continue working on a cure and let Danny get his rest.

"I'll take this to the lab." Spectra swirled the vial of blood around.

Vlad didn't respond. He watched the IV flow into Danny's blood stream drip by drip.

* * *

When Danny awoke, two days had passed. The spectral nutrients helped keep his head clear, and his ghost form healthy for now.

Sam cried from sheer relief. Danny was still awake. They still had time! "Danny, you're alright!" She kissed his forehead through the surgical mask she wore. The bacteria may infect people through the skin pores, but it didn't look like it could be caught from another person like that. Where exactly did this bacterium come from?

"Sam." Danny placed his hand over hers. "Don't cry."

But the goth girl couldn't help it. Seeing Danny in this weakened state made her think back to the night four years ago in Paris. The apprehension of not knowing whether or not he would make it out alive was eating away at her.

"Sam. Go get…my…parents." Danny rasped out in weak breaths.

"Danny, you don't mean…"

"Yes. I'm going to tell them while I still can."

Sam looked worriedly to Vlad, who held a similar expression. She turned back to Danny. "Is that really what you want?"

He nodded gently. He then took Sam's hand and changed back into a human. It seemed that shifting forms was becoming more painful.

"Daniel, you need to stay in your ghost form!" Vlad quickly pulled the spectral IV drip out of the younger halfa's arm. The nutrients would only nourish the bacteria in his human form.

"My parents…need…to see me…transform."

Sam stood up. "I'll go get them now. Just hold on!"

* * *

"Where is he? You found Danny?" Jack asked worriedly. Danny had left for work three days ago and never returned home. His friends and Vlad said they saw him leave for home, but nothing after that.

"Yes, yes, but…he's not doing so well."

"What do you mean?" Maddie was about to tear up. She had been sick with worry, wondering where her son had disappeared to.

"He's fallen ill. I have him in the medical ward; we're on our way there now." The silver haired man explained as he led the couple down the hall. Vlad handed each of them a surgical mask. "Put these on. You will need them."

"Vlad, what's wrong with him." Maddie asked desperately. Why was the man avoiding all her questions?

"You'll see." Vlad gravely responded. He pushed the door open, revealing an incredibly pale and sick Danny Fenton.

Maddie and Jack gasped at the sight. They rushed to their son's side.

"Danny! What's wrong?" Maddie turned back to Vlad. "Vlad! What the hell does he have?"

"Mom!" Danny called as loudly as he could. "Before we can answer…anything. There…is something…I have to show….you." He closed his eyes and willed his ghostly counterpart forward. He didn't open his eyes at first, but his parents' loud gasps still reached him.

Maddie and Jack stared at the white haired ghost in front of them. Their own son was Danny Phantom? It all made sense now. His bad grades in high school, his constant sneaking out, the random bruises he would come home with claiming to have 'tripped at school'. How could they not have seen this earlier? The creature they threatened to kill and dismember was their own son!

Jack forgave Danny instantaneously. How could he not? That was his own son. At most he couldn't forgive himself for having fired lethal weapons at him. He ruffled the mess of silver on Danny's head. "Don't you worry a thing boy. We're going to solve this." Jack had no idea what was wrong, but he would do anything if it meant saving his son.

Maddie on the other hand was torn apart. She hated ghosts! Ghosts killed her parents, making her and her sister orphans at such a young age. Her son was one of them? He was cavorting and dealing with other ghosts? He was terrorizing Amity Park? She stood up promptly and marched out the room.

"Maddie, wait!" Vlad followed her out. This would tear Daniel apart; he couldn't have her reject him like that!

"What, Vlad? How long have you known? Why did Danny let you know his secret, but not me, his own mother? How can I deal with this? My son is a ghost!" She cried out. "I hate ghosts!"

"And it's all your fault!" Vlad stopped before he could give anything else away.

"What are you talking about?"

Forget it. This was for Daniel. "It was your bloody portal that turned him into a ghost! It was your bloody portal that did this to me!" Vlad changed into his ghost form, no longer caring about keeping his own secret.

Maddie let out another gasp. "The Wisconsin Ghost? You're the Wisconsin Ghost? You tried to kidnap me at the twentieth college reunion?"

"That's not what we're talking about!" How Vlad hated yelling at the love of his life. "We're talking about Daniel here! You did this to him and I will not allow you to walk away like this. He's your son and you do not believe how lucky you are. I spent years trying to convince Danny to abandon you and your oaf of a husband to be my son, but he stood by you morons. I could have given him everything he wanted, I understood what he was going through, I would have been a better parent, but he still refused! You are not just going to walk away and leave him on his death bed."

"Death bed! You won't even tell me what's wrong!"

"Why do you care? Aren't you going to abandon your son?"

Maddie put her hands over her face as she started crying. "How could I? I swore vengeance against the ghosts for killing my parents."

"Maddie, not all ghosts are evil. Your son is widely known for his benevolent acts. You should be proud. Why don't you talk with him a bit? He is still the same boy you gave birth to."

Maddie wiped her tears away. "Yeah."

* * *

"Vlad, you said Aragon was going to call us back in three days! It's been a week, and I don't think we can wait much longer." Dani was so angry she could have flown into Aragon's castle and punched the prince square in the jaw.

"I know, but this is rather strange. Daniel saved his kingdom; it wouldn't be like Aragon to leave such a debt unpaid. Maybe he's forgotten? We have been kind of busy with Daniel's parents." Vlad had explained everything to them, introduced them to the ghosts who worked for him and to the ones that hung around the building a lot. He didn't tell them everything. He and Maddie had agreed on keeping his Wisconsin ghost a secret from Jack and, although he did introduce Dani to them as another halfa, he did not explain her origins to them.

Dan had made it a game of scaring them by telling them things he remembered back when he still had some humanity in him. He chose not to tell them that they were actually his parents. The two made a mental note to stay away from him.

Spectra got them up to date on everything from the bacteria to how a halfa's body is different from a human's body.

Maddie and Jack asked Danny questions little by little like 'What happened with the portal?' to embarrassing ones like 'Have you dated ghost girls?'

Once they saw how deep the rat hole went, the two Fentons became a part of it. They immediately shifted all their work from destroying ghosts to finding a cure for Danny.

"It's kind of hard to forget that someone is dying and you are their only chance of survival." Sam pointed out, returning Vlad to their conversation.

Vlad continued to reorder the papers he had so carelessly shoved into his desk earlier that morning. "I understand. I'm just as worried about Daniel as you are, but you are all working under the assumption Aragon's medics know about this sickness."

"He knows about it alright! How could he kick us out of the castle under the grounds of it being 'contagious' if none of us know how it is transmitted person to person?" The female halfa wanted to shake the desk in front of her.

"Maybe he is taking guess. That's all we can do right now. Just guess."

"Guessing is not going to save Danny. Look, I'll just go see Aragon myself. You know he can never say no to me." Sam wished that her previous statement applied to everything, but Aragon could say 'no' whenever she asked him to stop visiting her at random intervals throughout the month.

"Alright, alright, you can go try one more time, but do not do anything rash. I don't want to have to go in there after you." Vlad relented. Maybe he could use Samantha to get through to Aragon. That ghost could be so stubborn sometimes!

"Thanks, Vlad." The two left to prepare for a trip into the Ghost Zone.

* * *

"You guys sure you don't want me to tag along?" Valerie hung outside the speeder from the window.

"We'll be fine. Besides, with Danny out of commission we need you here to fend off any ghosts that might attack." Dani climbed into the driver's side.

"I've got Dani here," Sam threw her arm around the younger girl's shoulder. "What could possibly go wrong?"

Valerie laughed and closed the door. She walked over to the portal's switch panel. She typed in the password, pulled the lever, and opened the swirling green portal. She counted down to three and motioned the girls to fly through.

The speeder started up with a soft whirring noise before shooting off into the infinite realms of the dead.

* * *

"With this I adjourn the council meeting." Aragon rose and stood by the door way, bidding all those in his royal council good-bye. When everyone was out of sight he, returned to his private chambers and plopped himself down unceremoniously on the bed. He looked up when he heard a knock on his door.

"Oh brother, you have a visitor." Dora poked her head in.

"Tell them to come another time, I'm busy." Yeah. Busy sleeping.

"But it's Samantha."

Aragon shot up like a rocket. He stopped in front of his door and took a few collective breaths. He didn't want to look too excited in front of her. When he was ready, he stepped out and walked to the main hall of the castle. "Samantha, my dear, how are you?" He took one of her hands in his own.

"I'm fine…thanks." She tried to indiscreetly pull her hand out of Aragon's grasp, but found it too tight.

Aragon already knew what she was here for, to save her little boyfriend, but he would still milk this time for everything it was worth. This was going to be the day he would finally get the girl of his dreams. He led her down the corridor to his study, still holding her hand all the while. "To what do I owe the pleasure of your company?"

Sam took a seat in the chair directly across from Aragon. "Aragon, I want the cure for the disease Danny got." She wasn't going to beat around the bush. She hated being alone with Aragon, but if Dani was here the girl would lose her temper and the chance of getting the information they needed.

"What makes you so sure I have it?"

"I know you do. Call it 'woman's intuition'. Why won't you just give it to us? Do you want Danny to die?"

Aragon folded his hands together and contemplated his answer. "What if I do?"

Sam gasped and stood up in horror. Who was this monster? She turned to leave when something pulled her back.

Aragon held a firm grasp on Sam's arm, preventing her from leaving. "How about we make a little agreement, dear?"

Sam pulled her arm free, not liking where this was going. "What kinds of agreement?"

"It's simple. I will give you what you need to save the halfa. In return, you will join my kingdom and become my bride."

* * *

**AHAHAHAHHAHAHAH Cliff Hangers… **

**I haven't had a good one since the first chapter of Second Chance.**

**As always, I hope you enjoyed the chapter.**

**Review Please!**


	9. Sacrifices

**Can you paint with all the colors of the wind?**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters. **

* * *

Chapter Nine: Sacrifices

"No!" Sam stepped away from the ghost, completely horrorstricken.

"Then your little boyfriend will die."

Sam didn't know what to do. She hated Aragon with a fiery passion! How could she ever consent to being with him? But if she didn't Danny would die. She could save him, but at what price? How would she ever be able to tell him that she was leaving for good? How would she ever be able to look him in the eye again? She fell to her knees as her mind raced around a continuous loop. She covered her face with her hands and sobbed.

This couldn't be happening.

"Why don't you return home and think it over a bit. You may return once you have you answer. I am sure you will make the right decision."

* * *

"…and he ran off."

Dani, Alasdair, and Jerome shared a laugh at the joke.

"That is so cowardly! What kind of a man does such?" Alasdair wiped a tear from his eyes as he tried to stop laughing.

"Oh! Look!" Jerome pointed to something behind the Specter Speeder. "Samantha approaches! Hello Samantha!"

Sam didn't answer, she didn't even look up. She stormed passed the three floating ghosts, seated herself inside the specter speeder, and slammed the door shut without a word, the heavy frown never leaving her face.

Dani's face fell as this could only mean things had gone badly. "I better go. I'll see you guys later." She waved goodbye and phased into the speeder. "How did it go?" She questioned as she phased into the driver's seat.

Sam had her arms crossed and a glare on her face. "Let's just get out of here."

Dani silently started up the speeder.

* * *

"How are you feeling, sweetie?" Maddie put her hand on her son's forehead, feeling the heat rise into her hand. The monitors already told her he had a high fever, but she knew the physical contact would still be comforting to him.

"I'm fine, Mom." Danny whispered. He felt far from fine. He felt like he was in a freezer, but he couldn't have any more blankets. Apparently it would cause him to heat up even more and progress the speed of the bacteria. Not to mention he felt nauseous and hadn't eaten anything for the past twenty four hours. Not that it mattered anyways; he would only throw it back up.

Maddie smiled, knowing her son was trying to be strong for her. Vlad had been right the whole time about Danny being the same person. How could she have thought otherwise? Was she a mother or not?

"Mom, where's Dad?" Danny's voice pulled her away from her musings.

"Your father is at home. He's trying to whip up a concoction using some of our own stuff."

Danny nodded and closed his eyes, too weak to respond.

* * *

Aragon spent the remainder of the day with a smile on his face. He finally did it! He was finally going to become King with the woman of his affection by his side as Queen.

The humans had been right to suspect him all along. His kingdom had a few cases of Young Phantom's sickness. It had been a frightful experience, but thanks to a lab incident with some aspiring medics, they were able to concoct a cure before it spiraled out of control.

His unusually happy demeanor had alarmed a few of the castle's workers, who were far too used to his usual frown and curtness. They avoided him at all costs, which was never a good idea. Aragon could easily tell when his subjects were trying to wiggle out of their chores or other tasks, but this day he let it go. There would soon be a momentous and joyous event to be celebrating, a day off would be justified.

Of course, his sister had to be the brave one and rain on his parade.

"Aragon, what did you and Samantha discuss?" Dora followed him through the shelves of the library.

"Nothing. Just small talk." He pulled a book off a shelf and pretended to skim through.

"I am supposed to believe Samantha came all this way for an evening chat? I don't suppose you drank tea as well?"

"Well, dear sister, I'm sorry that there is someone who wants to spend some time with me."

Dora rolled her eyes, a little antic she picked up from Dani, and continued. "Yes, because all the girls throw themselves at your feet. Tell me the truth."

"Are you accusing me of being a liar?"

"Enough games, Aragon!" Dora slammed the book in his hands shut. "I have been talking with Danielle and she told me of your refusal to aid her brother."

"It was for the safety of the kingdom! You are the princess, you should know all about that."

"That's not my concern at the moment. Samantha left looking rather upset. Do not tell me you've blackmailed Samantha for the information."

"What would lead you to believe such?" His tone shifted to that of innocence.

Dora crossed her arms over her chest and gave Aragon a knowing look. Aragon only ever smiled when talking about Samantha or destroying an enemy. Chances are it was the former, and to see him smiling all day led Dora to believe he had done the unthinkable.

"You know what, Dorathea? I did. This kingdom needs a queen and I will not take anyone other than Samantha. Say what you want and do as you please, but my decision shall stand. I am doing this because it is the only way."

"And do you think Samantha will simply accept her fate and suddenly fall in love with you? Don't you think she will come to resent you for this?"

Aragon didn't respond. He knew Samantha would despise, even loathe, him for this, but she would get over it eventually. She couldn't spend her whole life hating him, right? "She will come around eventually."

Dora sighed. "Aragon, love is not something that you can just force a person into. You've seen Samantha's loyalty to Danny. I hardly think she would ever consider engaging herself completely in a relationship with you."

"You romantics. You think you know everything. Emotions change over time." Aragon was most certainly not in the mood to hear one of her 'eternal passion' speeches. He heard enough of those when she would giver he yearly speech to the subjects.

"Aragon, you're a grown man, I can't tell you what to do, but I can advise you. As much as I'd love to have Samantha in the family, this isn't the way to do it. Just remember that I warned you. Samantha _will_ hate you forever." Dora watched as her brother strolled out of the library without another word. She sighed yet again before seating herself on the stair railing.

What ever could she do? She could not simply hand over the information to her human friends as it would constitute as treason. Treason according to the new laws that she helped write. If she went against them it would set a bad example for the kingdom, not to mention the chance of being tried and killed.

Why oh why did she suddenly have to start caring about the kingdom? That's right, because she know co-ruled with Aragon. She suddenly wished she had not cleared away the time-altering clouds all those years ago.

It was true, the kingdom did need a queen, but not like this! Not a queen that would never smile! Not one that would hate the very kingdom she rules over!

How could she allow Samantha to walk the alter with Aragon when she felt nothing but contempt for him? Wouldn't the subjects notice? Wouldn't her anger reflect in her rule and relationship?

Dora folded her hands and brought them up to her face. She did the only thing she could.

She prayed.

* * *

"Is that whelp really not doing any better?" Skulker asked as he tapped his foot. Without the halfa to hunt, he had nothing to do. He could let his prey out again, but it just didn't present the same kind of challenge to him. They were easy to catch, Danny on the other hand was quite a challenge. A challenge he had yet to accomplish.

"Ease up, sugar." Ember strummed her guitar lightly. "At the rate the old man's working, he'll be up in no time." The vocalist loved spending time with her husband, but not when he was irritable.

"There's nothing to do around here." The hunter lamented for the millionth time. He originally arrived in hopes of having a job to do for Plasmius, but the man was too busy to work on anything else.

Ember shot a pleading look to Spectra, who was too busy enjoying the scene to help out.

Skulker paced around the room before Spectra finally took mercy on Ember.

"You know, Skulker." Spectra began. "With Danny out, now would be a good time to scare some of the locals."

"My employer would never let me hear the end of it. Even if I could, I wouldn't. There is nothing more cowardly then attacking your enemy's territory when they are incapable of fighting."

Ember tweaked her guitar too sharply. There had to be something her husband could do. "Say, Skulker, why don't you try and get the monster that lives in the lake?"

Skulker's ears perked. "What monster?"

"The one that lives in Lake Eerie. You've encountered it before, remember?" Spectra knew he had seen it. Dani showed her pictures of Danny catching it and Skulker with his father on a fishing trip.

"Yes, but I thought the whelp's father disposed of it."

"You know, Danny. He always lets them go. Besides, I don't think he finds ghost flesh appetizing." Spectra sent a hopeful silent message to Ember.

"Hmm…it's a rather weak prey, but prey is still prey. I think I'll go check it out." Skulker opened up his jetpacks and phased out of the room.

The girls couldn't help but cheer at their own victory.

"Say, Ember, isn't today Skulker's day with Viki?" Spectra couldn't help but remark.

Ember face-palmed herself. She would have to spend hours scrubbing the liquid ectoplasm off her daughter tonight. If only that girl didn't despise baths so much…

* * *

Sam sat quietly next Danny's bedside.

The halfa was asleep, his even breathing echoing through the metallic room.

Sam held onto one of his cold pale hands, mindlessly running over it with her fingertips. "Oh, Danny." She ran a hand through the mess of his silver hair. It felt so much thinner.

How much longer did he have? How much longer could she put this off?

Danny was dying, but there was something she could do! Just give up the rest of her life to be with someone she loathed and Danny would get to see another day.

"Danny, I love you so much." She whispered into his ear, not really caring if he was too deep in slumber to actually hear. "I'm so sorry, Danny. If there was any other way, I would take it." She let out a few sobs, desperately wishing she wouldn't have to do this.

Sam pulled her surgical mask off and placed a warm kiss on Danny's lips. If she was lucky she would contract the strange sickness, die, and take Aragon down with her to the fiery pits of hell. She stood up quietly, not wanting to wake Danny up now. She walked to the doorway and stopped halfway through.

"Goodbye, Danny." She silently shut the door behind her.

* * *

**NO, Sam!**

**On another note, let's give a round of applause to my wonderful Beta, DanPOWER! Yayz! Thank you so much! **

**Review Please!**


	10. The Unmentionable

**Can anyone here speak Arabic?**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters. **

* * *

Chapter Ten: The Unmentionable

Dani silently watched Sam leave the medical ward of the lab. What did she mean by 'if there was another way'? She silently followed her in her ghost form.

Sam checked her watch. It was a little past one in the morning. She should be able to get into the Ghost Zone without anyone noticing. She walked down the maze-like halls until she reached the portal room. She powered up the portal, and was about to climb into the speeder when a voice stopped her in her tracks.

"Sam, where are you going?"

The goth girl turned to see the female halfa regain visibility. "I'm going to do what I have to." An ominous tone melded into her voice.

"When are you coming back?" Dani reformed her legs and landed next to the control panel.

"I'm not. I can't stand Danny anymore! He's always gotten on my nerves and I never want to see him again! That man makes me sick. He's more of a boy than a man!"

Dani was taken aback by her outburst. That is most certainly not what she heard in the medical ward. "You just told Danny you loved him!"

"I'm a nice enough person to not say it to his face. Why don't you get your whiny, nosy, little butt out of here and out of my business." Sam figured if she was going to make Danny hate her, she might as well make everyone hate her. She would never be able to face them again anyways. "You guys are all so pathetic! 'Oh, look at me, I'm saving Amity Park!' Well, good for you! I won't do it anymore! You fruitcakes drive me up the wall and I won't stand one more day of it! You can take your apology and your love and shove it right up your ***."

Dani was heart-stricken. Sam couldn't possibly mean any of this, right? "Sam, you're just confused. Why don't I take you home?"

Sam didn't answer, but continued to set up the speeder for travel. "Do me a favor."

"What's that?"

"Burn in hell." Sam sprayed Dani with some ghost knock-out spray, courtesy of Maddie, and watched her fall to the ground. She stood back and thought for a moment. If she left Dani like this chances are they would go looking for her. She had to stop them from coming after her.

Sam dug through a few file cabinets until she found a notepad and a pen.

_Dear Danny, _

_I'm leaving you because I can't stand the idea of being with you anymore. After three years, I've come to realize that I don't love you. I'm going away, so don't expect to see me come running back anytime soon. How could I have been with you for so long? You disgust me. _

_-Sam Manson_

Sam stared at the letter with a frown. She didn't have time to come up with anything better. She didn't know how long Dani would be knocked out and couldn't risk having her wake up and alert every one of her departure. She sloppily folded the letter and tucked it under Dani's arm. "I'm sorry." She pushed the girl's bangs out of her eyes before wiping the tears out of her own eyes.

There was no turning back after this.

At least Danny would never have to learn about her secret shame, about what she really was doing.

She climbed into the speeder and flew into the portal.

* * *

Dan flew worriedly through the city.

Dani had left a few hours ago to patrol for ghosts, but never returned. Where could she be?

He flew around the suburbs, but didn't see her. Could she have crashed at Valerie's? No, she would have called and told him.

He did a double-take in his patrol and went to the office. She was probably working late to help find a cure for Danny. Ever since Vlad had been staying at the lab to work late and see to Danny, she had taken to working in the lab whenever she found the time.

Dan phased inside the building and flew to the medical wing. Danny was sleeping in his hospital bed, but no Dani.

He continued searching the rooms until he reached the portal room. The portal was open, and Dani was lying unconscious off to the side. Had she fallen asleep while waiting for someone to return? Who had left for the Ghost Zone at this ungodly hour?

Dan approached her sleeping form when he noticed a piece of paper tucked under her hand. He read the letter done in rushed handwriting, signed by Sam.

This was going to be a doozy.

* * *

Dani quickly shot up. Where was she? She looked around to see a very surprised Dan. "Where's Sam?" She demanded.

"I don't know, but I found this letter under your arm." Dan handed her the paper, his expression solemn hinting to its content.

Dani quickly read Sam's farewell letter. "We have to go after her! Who knows what she's going to do!"

"No way." Dan stopped Dani before she could take off. "Not until you explain everything to me."

"I stopped by here to see Danny before going home, but Sam was already in with him. She was talking about doing 'what she had to'. I tried to stop her from going into the Ghost Zone, but she used knock out spray on me!"

"Do you even know where she went?" he asked.

"No…" Dani's thoughts flared back to the hateful things Sam said. The nerve! After everything they'd been through, that's all she had to say! "Forget it."

Dan raised an eyebrow in question. "Your friend ran off, and all you have to say is 'forget it'?"

"She left because she wanted to. Who cares about her anyways? If she wants to break Danny's heart, fine, but it's her who's losing big time." Dani looked down bitterly.

* * *

Sam landed the speeder outside of the kingdom's walls. It was pretty late at night, but the guards knew her well enough to let her in, thankfully without having to call Aragon to ask permission. She briskly walked through the sleeping town, avoiding eye contact with the few ghosts that were roaming around at this hour.

When she reached the castle, she was led into the castle's main hall by a servant and told to wait for Aragon to arrive.

"Prince Aragon…" The servant whispered quietly. Oh how she hated being the one who had to wake the man. "Prince Aragon."

"This had better be for an adequate reason." The dragon ghost glared daggers at the young girl from his bed.

"Samantha has arrived unannounced." the servant's voice trembled.

Aragon threw the covers off himself. "Why did you not inform me sooner? Has she been awaiting my presence for long?" He quickly found a dark maroon robe and threw it over his pajamas. He couldn't very well greet her in nothing but his night clothes.

The maid was about to answer when she was roughly shoved out of the way.

Prince Aragon walked briskly to the hall, where he saw his beloved gazing at a painting. He slowed down a bit. What should he say? He didn't want to sound too smug, nor did he want to sound uncaring.

He slowly approached her. "Samantha?"

The girl didn't respond. She continued looking up at the rather regal picture. The ghost in it looked like Aragon, and shared the same name, but she knew it wasn't him. There were a few physical differences and the man had much shorter hair. "Who is this?"

Aragon's eyes followed her to the painting. "This is my father, King Aragon the first."

"Is he still alive?" Sam continued to refuse to make eye contact with the man next to her.

"No. He died in a great battle many millennia ago."

"Why aren't you king then?"

"I have yet to wed." It was tradition for a prince to only formally inherit the throne upon marrying. Since Aragon had not settled down he was to bear the title 'prince', even though he ruled as king. That was all about to change.

"It looks like the kingdom will finally get its king."

Aragon looked back to the girl beside him. Was she…?

"I'm leaving Danny."

As hard as he tried, Aragon could not resist the urge to smile. "Well, my dear, welcome home." He wrapped an arm around Sam's waist and led her away from the portrait. "You there!" He barked at the servant girl who let Sam in. "Awake Dorathea and bring her here at once."

Sam watched the terrified girl run down the hall and out of sight. "You are going to give us the cure, right?"

"I will send it with Jerome and Alasdair first thing tomorrow morning." He walked with her down the hall to the bedchambers, hoping to meet his sister halfway. When he caught up with the blonde haired princess, she was already panting, out of breath.

"Samantha!" Dora exclaimed in shock. She didn't think Sam would ever agree to Aragon's terms.

"Dorathea, can you allow Samantha to accompany you until a proper room can be set up for her?"

"Of course." She stuttered out. Samantha was really going to be staying. She was really going to stay with Aragon. "Follow me."

The three of them walked in silence until they reached their destination. Sam took a hold of Aragon's hand and took it off her waist. She agreed to be with him, she never agreed to engage in any sort of behavior.

Aragon frowned, but let it go. He couldn't say he hadn't been expecting it.

"This is my room." Dora stopped in front of a sky blue door. It had a golden dragon crest painted on the front.

"My room is directly across." Aragon indicated to the black door with the similar symbol and a lot more detail around it. "If you need anything feel free to ask any of the servants."

"Yeah. Thanks." Sam silently followed Dora into the bedroom.

"Goodnight." Aragon followed after Sam, trying to place a kiss on her cheek, but failed when the girl roughly elbowed him in the stomach. He gasped and grabbed ahold of his abdomen. This was going to take a lot longer than he thought.

* * *

Dani silently slipped out of the bed, trying not to wake up Dan. She quietly walked into the living room and turned the T.V on.

She couldn't sleep. Her guilty conscious was eating away at her for letting Sam go like that. What if she ran into serious trouble?

Before that, why was she running into the Ghost Zone? If she really wanted to leave because of them, wouldn't she have run away to another human city? Ghosts didn't take too nicely to other humans. There were only a few places Sam could have gone for safe harbor. Maybe she was just going for a run to clear her head or something. The stress of watching Danny waste away must have really been taking a toll on her.

Dani flipped the channels without actually paying attention to what was on.

If Sam wasn't back within a few days, she'd panic.

* * *

The next morning, Dora woke Sam early to discuss a few things.

"Now, Samantha, are you sure there was no other way? Was Sir Plasmius unable to come up with anything?"

Sam smiled at Dora. At least she wasn't alone here. "We tried, but I didn't want to wait any longer. Danny's half-ghost, so if he goes into a coma, I think the sores would eat him away faster than if he was full human."

Dora sympathetically rubbed the girl's back. "Oh, Samantha. I am so sorry it has to be this way."

"Don't worry about it. It's not your fault."

Dora turned their conversation to a different matter. "I don't suppose you brought any clothing with you?"

"No, I kind of left in a hurry." Sam sheepishly rubbed the back of her head.

Dora understood. "I'm sure we can find something in my wardrobe that would suit your tastes."

The girls searched through the racks of formal dresses, all in bright colors, to Sam's distaste, before they finally found the only black dress Dora owned. The dress was pretty simple compared to the others. It was long sleeved and came down to her ankles.

Sam pulled and tucked at the dress, trying to make it more stylish but eventually settled on it's original appearance. Did all medieval dresses have to be so cumbersome?

"Do not fret over it. You look fine. Although, some may be taken aback by your preferred choice of color." Dora mused to mostly herself. The only reason she had that dress was for the occasional funeral ceremony. Last time she wore it was to attend Pandora' s burial.

"Well, what can I say? I'd hate to blend in with the crowd." Sam attempted a smile, but it turned out more like a grimace.

"Trust me, I know." Dora recalled the first time the girl had been brought here. She had been so free-spirited and rebellious. The previous council had been so shocked to see the girl grab onto the chandelier and swing from it. The only girls they had known were refined ladies. What an eye opener Sam was!

Now here she was, that same girl from all those years ago, sitting quietly as her entire future suddenly shifted courses.

* * *

"Be sure not to disclose anything unnecessary." Aragon warned the two boys standing in front of him.

"Yes, sir." Jerome gave a fake, mocking salute.

Aragon raised an eyebrow at the young boy. As the one of the only five remaining dragon descendants, Aragon was often very lax with him, letting a lot of his jokes, many of which could be considered rude, go.

"Sorry." Jerome sheepishly put his hand back down. He turned to his brother only to see him giving him the same look.

"You are both dismissed." Aragon waved them off.

* * *

Sam awkwardly looked around the dining room. It was huge with rows and rows of tables, clearly meant for larger engagements.

"How was your night?" Aragon asked to break the silence.

"Huh?" Sam stopped eating to look at the man. "It was fine."

"Your room should be complete by this evening. If there is anything you would like, do not be embarrassed to ask."

Sam nodded and returned to her food.

"I was thinking we could go out for a stroll this afternoon." he remarked, watching her expression from the corner of his eye.

Sam spit out the orange juice mid-sip. Did the man just set up a date? "Excuse me?"

"A stroll through the kingdom. What kind of queen would you be if you were not acquainted with the land you rule?"

"Queen?" Sam knew she would be with Aragon, but as queen? That would mean marrying. She did not want to marry Aragon!

"Yes, Queen. You did not think we would engage in adulterous behavior did you?"

Sam felt her stomach sink. Adulterous behavior? This was too much for one day. Aragon could not have been looking that far into the future. "When?"

"I don't understand."

"When are you going to announce the wedding?"

"I plan to announce our engagement tonight. The wedding date will be determined by the council. Do you have any objections to the current arrangement?"

"No. It's fine. We can go out today."

* * *

"This is such a relief. Tell Aragon we send a thousand thanks to him." Vlad led the two dragon ghosts into the laboratory. "This is everything we have."

"This is perfect. Gather around, we'll show you what you need." Alasdair took a seat and pulled out a test tube of the bacteria from his briefcase. He looked around to see everyone put their surgical masks on. "You don't need those. It cannot get to you through your mouth."

Jerome continued the set up for his brother and took over. "The first thing you need to understand is that is this not a bacteria."

"It's not?" Maddie quizzically looked at the test tube.

"No. Its single celled ghosts. Although being single celled might constitute as the bacteria in the human terms, it is different for ghosts. The nucleus of the cell contains a brain. The microscopic ghosts aren't affected by anything you've tried so far because they aren't bacteria."

"So what do we do?" Vlad asked.

"The same thing you do to get rid of ghosts in your territory. You need to drive them out." Alasdair nonchalantly responded. "How do you get rid of ghosts?"

"We fight them. We can't exactly fight something microscopic." Tucker reasoned.

"No. But you can use something else." Jerome smiled. "How about a ghost repellent?"

"A repellent? We don't make repellents." Vlad knew his company's products pretty well. Where else could the dragon kingdom have gotten the technology to make a repellant? "And even if we did, the make-up of it would be lethal if injected into ghosts or half ghosts."

"You don't have one, but someone else has made one." Alasdair pointed at the Fenton matriarch and patriarch. "One that is not quite lethal."

"Our repellent? How did you get ahold of it?" Jack asked slightly upset. Ghosts were breaking into his ghost proof lab?

"Your portal. You do realize that keeping it open defeats the purpose of ghost proofing your house, right?"

The two stared at each other in confusion. "We never leave the portal open." said Maddie.

"You don't, but your husband does. All the time, in fact." Jerome recalled the several times he would slip into the human world via the portal. Most of the time the old man would be asleep in front of the portal with a fishing rod in hand. One day his carelessness would get him killed.

"We can't use the repellent. It's still a prototype, it doesn't work completely."

Jerome smiled. "That's exactly why we use it. It doesn't completely work, so it won't kill us off as other repellents would."

Maddie gave Jack a look. She was still a little unsure about the entire idea. "So we inject the repellant into Danny? You're sure it won't cause any permanent damage."

"Think of it as your human treatment of chemotherapy. The radiation kills healthy cells, and makes the patient very sick, but it destroys the sickness in the long run. Danny will get over the side effects eventually." Alasdair demonstrated by putting a few drops of the Fenton repellant into an infected petri dish. The little ghosts began scattering in clumps around the confine. The continued to scatter around the dish with no look of stopping.

"So now what? They stay like that?" Spectra took the dish and examined it herself.

"Yes. Within a few days they will die out."

"Are you sure this won't kill Danny? If it can kill these ghosts, why wouldn't it be able to kill him?" Valerie had seen this stuff and actually had some, thanks to Danny sneaking weapons out to her. She had used it for its intended purpose, never for lethal purposes. Who knew what it could actually do? She didn't want to find out the hard way.

"It mostly has to do with dosage and size. Danny is much, much larger than these guys. His body can handle it, but, as we already stated, he will be very sick for a few days afterwards. The ghosts we administered this to all survived, but to be safe, you can give it to Danny in his human form. If I am correct, it has no effect on humans, but since he is half ghost the after effects should only be half as strong." Alasdair held out a vial to the group of ghosts and humans alike.

"Microscopic ghosts, huh?" Vlad ran a hand through his hair in disbelief. So much for Axion Labs being number one.

* * *

Sam stood perfectly still as Dora pulled several strings to tighten the corset around her waist. "How do you breathe in this thing?" She gasped as her airways were slowly constricted.

"Well, as a ghost I don't really breathe. Would you like me to loosen it for you?" Dora blushed a she had forgotten he human girl needed oxygen to survive.

"Can we get rid of it all together?"

"I'm afraid the dress won't fit properly if you are not wearing the corset. I'll loosen it a bit." Dora went to work, undoing the ties and opening the back a bit.

Sam looked around the room and settled for staring at the dress. Dora told her she probably shouldn't wear the black dress around town, so after some serious arguing, Sam settled for her next favorite color, lavender. Oh how she loathed dresses of any kind. Maybe if she glared at the accursed article of clothing long enough it would burst into flames.

Unfortunately, the dress did not explode into a fiery mess, but was removed from the stand by two of Dora's ladies-in-waiting. The dropped the dress onto her and began to pull and the seams so it would fit properly.

"Do not look so upset, Samantha." One of the ladies stated with a mouthful of pins. "The people won't be happy to find Aragon's intended a sour puss."

"Great. Is that what everyone's going to start calling me? Aragon's intended?" Sam wanted to fold her arms across her chest, but the ladies were still working on the sleeves.

"It is out of respect. It would be incredibly rude to call the future queen by her first name. Once you and Aragon are officially wed, people will refer to you as Queen Samantha." Dora stood back and admired the dress. "Now, for your hair…"

"If you even try to put hat ridiculous hat on me, I will tear you limb from limb." Sam snarled.

The ladies-in-waiting stopped in their tracks.

"It's alright. The hat is of no importance, and I must agree with you Samantha. It is rather cumbersome." Dora herself did not wear the hats because of how utterly inconvenient they were. Most girls looked better without them on anyways. "As for your hair. How about we take this pony tail out and leave it down?"

Sam grumbled. "Fine, fine."

Dora reached up and removed the scrunchie holding Sam's ponytail up. The hair cascaded down to a little past Sam's shoulders. Dora began combing the hair back and pinned it so it was out of Sam's eyes.

The ladies also stepped back, admiring their work.

"Perfect! All we need now are shoes and you will be ready to go!" Dora helped Sam with the final ties on the dress and led her out of the dressing room and into her own private chambers. Dora opened one of the wardrobes to reveal rows upon rows of shoes.

Sam was not going to enjoy this one bit.

* * *

Dani and Dan stood outside the medical ward with Alasdair and Jerome, watching Vlad and Spectra administer the repellent to Danny.

Dani ran her hands over Dan's arms, which were wrapped securely around her waist. She was so happy! Danny was going to make it! Yet, at the same time, Dani was sad. What would she tell Danny when he asked about Sam? She couldn't tell him what that girl had told her. Danny would be so devastated. He loved Sam with every fiber of his being.

Dan couldn't help but notice the distress on the younger girl's face. He knew what she was worrying about. The two of them had conspired a cover story for Sam, claiming her parents pulled her to another state for a funeral of an uncle. Sam hadn't returned yet, so they would eventually have to tell the others that the girl had run off into the Ghost Zone and yet to return. "Don't worry. We'll go look for her tonight."

"Look for whom?"

The two turned to the teenage dragon ghosts, having completely forgotten they were there. They looked at each other, silently debating whether to tell them.

"Well, Sam disappeared into the Ghost Zone a few days ago and hasn't returned."

"Samantha?" Jerome asked in mirth. "She's fine."

"What?" The shock was clearly evident on Dani's face.

"She's at our kingdom with Aragon-" Jerome was cut short when Alasdair slapped a hand on his mouth to stop him from continuing.

"With Aragon…? What is she doing with Aragon?" Dani walked out of Dan's grasp to shake Alasdair's shoulders. "What happened, Alasdair?"

"Nothing. I know not of what you speak."

"Did you know that ward is sound proof?" Dan said out of no-where.

The other three stared at him in silence. Where had that come from?

"Not in the way that it would keep sound in, but keep sound out." He continued. If there were to be an attack, the alarms would not be heard in that room. His fists suddenly lit with red ectoplasm as he picked Alasdair up by the collar of his shirt. "If there were a, I don't know, ghost attack happening, they wouldn't be able to hear it. So," Dan's hand drifted too close to Alasdair's neck for comfort "Are you going to tell us what happened?" His red eyes glowed at the ghost.

Alasdair couldn't help but scream. He had seen Dan fight several times. It was truly a fearsome sight. No one messed with Dan and lived to tell the tale. "I'll tell you! I'll tell you! Just set me down!"

Dan let go of the ghost, letting him fall to the floor.

"Aragon made her leave Danny for the cure. She arrived at the kingdom a few days ago and Aragon plans to announce their engagement tonight." His terrified voice waivered during his explanation.

"Tonight? So soon?" Dani's own voice was filled with worry.

"Yes. Aragon wants to make it official before Sam has a chance to change her mind."

"Not that she really can. We already gave you the cure." Jerome added.

Dan sent him a glare, successfully silencing him. "You did give us the cure. We have no further use for you. Leave."

The two didn't move at first, pondering whether to stay and make sure Danny was okay or high-tail it out of there. They didn't have to think long, for an ecto-blast from Dan answered their question. They quickly phased out of the room, flying as fast as they could to the portal.

"Did you have to frighten them?" Dani asked, smiling as her question contradicted her mood.

"It's been so long. How could I resist?"

Dani laughed and playfully slapped Dan's arm. Sam didn't hate Danny. She was okay. And they were going to get her back.

* * *

**I was watching "The Ultimate Enemy" again and when I saw Dan being all evil and awesome, I thought "No! What have I done to the awesome Dan! It's like I domesticated him."** **I'm trying my best to fix it. **

**I'd like to give lots of love to my beta DanPOWER for her wonderful work. You're such a life saver!**

**Review Please!**


	11. The Town

**This is a day early because I'm leaving for London tonight and won't have time to uplaod tomorrow. Shout out to all my readers in the U.K!**

**I'm at a place called Vertigo!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters.**

* * *

Chapter Eleven: The Town

Sam looked straight ahead, trying her best not to make eye contact with the other ghosts. Of course a woman at Aragon's arm would attract attention.

A lot of attention.

It seemed that everyone was stopping to watch the two of them walk by.

Sam was desperately wishing that she could turn invisible every time she saw a ghost whisper. They knew who she was (from her having previously spent time in the kingdom), and that made it all the worse. The wisps of conversations she heard varied from 'It is good the king has found a girl' to 'was she not with Phantom?'.

It seemed anything reminding her of Danny would cause the tears to spill over**. **Thanks to her years as a goth, she learned to control her emotions and stop them, but the heartache remained. At least Danny was going to be okay. She wouldn't have to live with the guilt of knowing he died when she could have done something about it.

Sam turned her attention back to Aragon. The man was giving silent, but deadly glares to any citizen who ventured too close. He didn't want Samantha to feel too overwhelmed about her new situation.

Where they were going was still a mystery to Sam; Aragon told her she would need some 'essentials'. She assumed he meant clothing and that sort of thing, but she was certainly surprised when they stopped in front of a jeweler.

Aragon pushed the door open with one arm, holding it open for Sam like a proper gentleman. He closed the door behind the two of them, nodding to the jeweler, who then rushed to lock the door and put a closed sign up in the window.

Sam couldn't help but be drawn in by the pieces in the display window. The blood of the rubies, gleam of the silver, and sparkle of the diamonds shined strongly, demanding the attention of all those who passed by.

"Oh, you musn't be interested in these, my Queen." The jeweler, a rather stout ghost, lifted the displays out of the window, and removed the black velvet lining used to cushion the jewels. Underneath was a solid black surface. He ran his chubby fingers over it several times before a crease appeared down the middle and the black split into two with a little pop.

Sam continued watching as he began pulling several impressive jewels from the display case. "What are these for?" she asked Aragon without taking her eyes off the precious treasures.

Aragon was rather happy she asked. "These are the family jewels, passed down from one generation to the next, worn only by members of royalty." He drew back his cloak and pulled out a small package wrapped in a silk handkerchief. He carefully unwrapped it before placing it delicately in Sam's hands.

It was a plain gold crown. There were several spots where it was apparent jewels were to be placed. It still retained a healthy luster, regardless of the clear signs of age.

Sam stared at the empty piece of art in her hands for a long while. How old was it really? Ghosts lived far longer than humans, and the dragon line went very far back. It was amazing to hold something that had so much history to it. How many women had worn this crown? How many wars had it seen? How many years would it continue on, even long after Sam had passed away?

Aragon continued, noticing Sam was not going to say anything. "It is customary for the queen to personally select the stones for her crown. You are free to choose from anything in the vault."

* * *

"You're not going to just barge in there and start throwing punches. Right?" Dani's hair whipped behind her as she flew through the Ghost Zone.

"How do you supposed we go about to it then?" Dan asked, slightly annoyed that Dani always had to avoid the messy and violent way out of her problems.

"We can try talking with Aragon. You know, use reason and logic to win an argument."

"Oh, because that worked out so well last time, right?" Dan chuckled mockingly.

"Fine, fine, but just don't completely ruin it with Aragon. I do like coming here to visit Ghostwriter you know."

* * *

"Wake up, Danny." A voice faintly called in the distance. It sounded like his mother.

It was his mother! She was calling for him.

"Danny…"

The bed-ridden halfa slowly opened his eyes. His mother and father were leaning over his bedside with Vlad not too far behind.

"Oh, Danny!" Maddie pulled her son into a bone-crushing hug and sobbed her eyes out into his hair.

"Mom, I'm fine, really." He gave her a weak smile, even though she couldn't see it through her tears. "Where is everyone else?" He couldn't help but notice the lack of people in the room.

"Sam's been gone for a few days now, she's at a funeral. Valerie had been patrolling the city in your place. Tucker's at his classes in the community college, and Dan and Dani ran off in a hurry for some urgent business, they didn't say what exactly." Vlad continued to fill him in on everything he had missed and everything that would soon happen to him thanks to the make-shift cure.

"Well, at least we did it." Danny pried himself out of his mother's grip and back into his hospital bed. "We came up with a cure." He had a relieved, yet tired expression on his face.

"Yes, but it cost me a few years off my natural life span." Vlad was so amazed at Danny's nature. Even in a poor, pitiful state he still tries to make people smile.

"So how big are we going to be for this?" Danny asked, grinning.

"Very." Came Vlad's only reply.

* * *

Sam examined the various stones carefully. Having very extensive background in jewelry, partly from her parents, she knew exactly how this worked.

In a proper crown, the jewels should be valuable and enticing at the same time. The crown was symbol of authority, yet Sam would so anything to be rid of it. Last time she had worn a crown from Aragon, she had found herself trapped in his castle until Danny had saved her.

But this time, Danny wasn't coming. Danny wasn't going to save her. Danny was going to hate her, she had made certain of that.

Maybe that was the reason she chose a design of Onyx on Amethyst for her crown. The jewels were simple, not very valuable money wise, but they were perfect. Most people would not have given the precious metals a second glance, but Sam knew there was more to them. The black stones called to her, begging to be placed in the headwear.

No royalty would have ever selected something so dark or common for their crown. The stones just wanted a little attention, to be understood, that's all.

Aragon would have preferred she went for the colored diamonds or Alexandrite, but he had to give in to her decision. The amethyst jewels really brought out her eyes, making her all the more stunning.

Even the shopkeeper had to sigh at how beautiful Sam looked with the crown on her head and dress in place.

"I think I've decided what I want." Sam took the crown off her head and handed it to the jeweler.

* * *

"Let me do the talking." Dani flew ahead of Dan, landing in front of the watchtower. "Hello!" She called out, attracting the guard's attention. "Can you let us through?"

"Who goes there?" The guard called back.

Dan sighed at the stupid ritual they had to go through every time they came here. Were these guards really necessary? "Dani and Dan Phantom." He announced, a little irritated at teh waste of time.

"You may not pass."

The two Phantoms looked at each other in confusion.

"He must be new." Dani tried reassuring herself. She turned back to the guard. "I believe you are mistaken. King Aragon granted us permission to enter the kingdom grounds long ago."

The guard floated down from the tower, holding a document in his hand. "Your privilege has been revoked by his majesty, the king." He held the paper out for the two to examine.

Dani stared at it in bewilderment. The paper had Aragon's official seal on it, so it could not be a forgery. The man was really going to lengths to make sure they could not rescue Sam.

Too bad for him. Dani was determined to save her goth friend. As fast as lightening, she punched the guard in the stomach with all her might, knocking the breath and consciousness out of him. She took the fallen document, folded it up, and placed it in her hazmat suit.

Dan watched the scene play out with a smirk. He liked this side of Dani. It wasn't often he got to see her engage in aggressive behavior before logic or moral reasoning.

Dani wordlessly returned to her human form and walked through the giant walls surrounding the kingdom. A moment passed before she stuck her head back out again. "Well, are you coming or not?" She asked, slightly irritated that he had just been standing there the whole time.

"Alright, let's do this."

The two, in their human forms, quickly looked down the alley before running through it and through the adjacent wall.

* * *

"Yes, we made it!" Dani changed once again, flying off through the rows and rows of books in search of her friend. "Ghostwriter? Ghostwriter, where are you?" She called down the various rows.

"Over here!" A voice rang out from a pile of books stacked on top of a desk.

The two ghosts flew to the source, carefully maneuvering through the stacks as to not knock anything over.

Dan picked a book off the top of a random stack. "Cooking? Since when were you into cooking?" He asked the purple-clad ghost, who was currently hunched over a notepad, copying down a recipe.

"I thought I'd give it a try instead of always eating out." Ghostwriter responded. "Shouldn't you guys be a little more careful about being here." He remarked, already knowing of the situation between Aragon and the ghosts residing in Amity Park. As a librarian, he kept track of Aragon's personal declarations. "You could get into some serious trouble with Aragon if he were to catch you."

Dan scoffed. "As if his guards could take us." He cracked his knuckles.

Dani rolled her eyes. "What he means is, yes, we made sure no one saw us come, but that's not important. We need your help Ghostwriter!" She pleaded. "We have to get Sam back before Danny notices that she's not coming back."

"Danielle, I'd love to help you, but this is one thing I cannot do. I can't stand against Aragon when I reside in his very kingdom. To be honest, even if I could, I would not fight. I've had enough fighting for one hundred lifetimes. I simply want to reside with my books in peace."

"I understand that." she really did. She hated fighting to simply hold ground, but sometimes it had to be done. "But isn't there another way? Like, a legal way getting Sam out of this? Some law that says Aragon can't have a human bride or something?" She ranted, desperate to find a loophole.

"No, there aren't any laws prohibiting marriages to different species, but there might be something else." Ghostwriter set his pen down and drifted to another part of the library. He searched through the stacks of aging book until he found the precise one. "Here it is!"

Dan and Dani came in closer as Ghostwriter blew the dust off the cover of the book. He cleared his throat before beginning to read aloud in Latin.

The two stared at him when he finished, understanding nothing of what he had just said.

"This helps us?" Dan questioned.

"Oh, right." Ghostwriter pushed his glasses up to the bridge of his nose. "It basically says that if an arrangement between the prince and a future bride will cause problems for the kingdom, the council can call the marriage off."

Dani's face lit up. "So all we have to do is prove that Sam is more trouble than she's worth and Aragon will have to let her go!" She turned to Dan. "I have the perfect idea!"

Ghostwriter gently closed the decaying book, not wanting to cause any more damage to it. "More trouble to the kingdom, not to Aragon himself."

"I know." Dani's smile never faltered. "Thank you, Ghostwriter." She couldn't help but hug him. "This has been a big help! I knew coming here would be a great idea."

The Ghostwriter smiled. "You know, Aragon is announcing the engagement tonight. If you wear cloaks, you'll blend in with the crowd and be able to see it." Ghostwriter showed them one of the pamphlets that had been spread all over town.

"No thanks. We'll have to get this plan into motion before the actual wedding. There's no time to waste."

* * *

Sam continued to fiddle with the crown on her head. The anxiety was killing her. Within minutes she would be standing on the balcony with Aragon before the entire population of the Dragon Kingdom. How much worse could this day possibly get?

"Samantha, you must stop playing with your tiara." Dora lamented. "You're ruining your hair." The blonde haired ghost took the crown out of Sam's hair and brushed it for the third time. "I understand you are nervous, but you must try and look presentable to the people. You would not want them to say wicked things about you."

"Sorry." Sam dropped her hands into the folds of her dress without another word.

Dora continued brushing the raven locks, all the while looking at Sam. She had never seen the girl so down before. It was sad to watch her free spirit and liveliness slowly drain out of her. "Samantha, how would you like to go for a stroll through the courtyard once this is all over?"

"That sounds wonderful." Sam smiled to the dragon ghost standing above her.

A lady-in-waiting rushed into the room, looking quite frantic. "Is the future queen ready?" She asked. "It's time."

"Yes, all set to go." Dora placed the crown in the perfect position on Sam's head. "Now, remember. No fidgeting with the crown." She offered her hand to Sam and helped her up.

The two of them walked in silence to the balcony door.

"Are you ready?" Dora asked, her hand on the door knob.

"No. Let's just get this over with." Sam listened intently as Aragon announced her arrival.

Dora pushed the door open, gently nudging Sam forward.

Sam stepped into the grand scene, a fake smile sprawled across her face. She waved, forcing herself to remain calm and not go into a frenzy.

Aragon placed his arm around Sam's shoulders. "I present to you your future Queen!"

The crowd applauded and cheered.

* * *

**There's a storm outside my window. Very lovely!**

**Review Please! **


	12. Resourcefulness

**So…tired…**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny phantom or other relating characters.**

Chapter Twelve: Resourcefulness

"Hi Dani!" Danny gave her a weak smile. "Long time no see."

"Yeah. Things have been kind of hectic around here." Dani trailed off, hoping to stall. She would have to spill the bad news to Danny to put her plan into motion, but…how could she crush him like that? The poor boy couldn't even stand by himself now, and she was here to tell him that the love of his life was with someone else. She felt like she was taking candy from a baby. She had to make this count. She was telling everyone involved the little world of Axion Labs.

Almost everybody. The only ones not there were the ghost children and Danny's parents.

"Danny, we need to talk." Vlad spoke up, noticing the youngest halfa's hesitation. Dani had approached him earlier and explained the current dilemma. She told him she had a plan, but wanted everyone to be with her when she explained it, so he called everyone to Danny's room. It was Vlad who had decided against bringing Maddie and Jack into this. They may have been Danny's parents, but they would not know how to handle this kind of situation. They might get themselves killed, especially since they didn't know how to properly handle dragon ghosts.

"Okay, shoot." The male halfa leaned into his pillow, slightly nervous because of Vlad's tone. It was really the presence of the male ghosts that made him nervous. The only time he had gathered with guys was when they were fending off an attack or preparing to launch one.

The point; this had to be bad news.

Vlad began elaborately. "Well, when you were in the unconscious state of your sickness, Aragon was giving us a difficult-"

"Sam's with Aragon!" Dani spit out before Vlad could weave some intricate tale. She didn't want to seem insensitive, but Danny needed to know it straight. The clearer the facts, the smoother this would run.

"What!" Danny pulled himself forward with his remaining strength. "You said she was at a funeral!"

"She joined Aragon to save you!" Dani began crying. She really missed her friend. She missed seeing Danny so lively. She missed all the crazy adventures the gang would go on. "He made her. He wouldn't give us the cure any other way. I tried to stop her! She knocked me out and took the specter speeder. I'm sorry, Danny. I couldn't stop her."

"She did that…for me?" Danny's anger melded into sadness. Sam really threw it all away just to save him? His anger returned as he thought about the lonely old ghost. How dare he even think about putting his claws on his girl? "That, Aragon! Why I ought to…" Danny tried to climb out of his bed, but only managed to vomit all over himself and his sheets.

"Lean back, Daniel. You still haven't gotten over the effects of the repellant. Do not strain yourself." Vlad helped the younger halfa settle back in the bed. He took the vomit covered blanket off of him while Valerie went to fetch a fresh one.

"We have to save her!" Danny pleaded with the people around him.

"And we will." Valerie returned with the clean blanket. She unfolded it and placed it over Danny's weak form. "Don't think for a second we'll let Aragon get away with this, but we can't just storm into the castle blindly."

"She's right." Tucker piped up. "Aragon is probably expecting us. He must have upped up security in the castle."

"'Upped up' is an understatement." Dani took the document she received from Ghostwriter out. "We're not even allowed on the kingdom grounds."

The paper passed through the group, finishing with Danny.

"So, Danielle here says she has a plan." Vlad queued everyone's attention to her.

"Yes," She smiled. "I do. You see, there is a law stating that the council can call the arrangement off if the bride proves to be too much trouble for the kingdom."

"How are supposed to prove that if we're not allowed on the grounds?" Skulker inquired. He was always up for a good hunt, but there was a different between good and life-threatening.

"You are still allowed." Dani pulled the paper out of Danny's hands and showed it to the metallic ghost. "More specifically, you're kids are allowed." She pointed to Skulker and Box Ghost.

The two narrowed their eyes.

"I don't like where this is going." Box Ghost's surprisingly scary voice sent a subtle warning. He was not getting his daughter involved in this.

"Don't worry. It's going to work out just fine…"

Ember landed in front of the kingdom gates, two children in tow. Her heart beat with nervousness, wondering if Aragon had changed his mind and banned all ghosts associated with Danny. Her worries were lifted as the guards waved her through.

Box Lunch and Viki chattered about excitedly, knowing nothing about their true purpose in the kingdom. They had simply been informed that they were going to meet Evella for a play date at the castle. This always riled them up. How could it not? The expanses of the castle made it the perfect place to play hide-and-seek.

As normal, Evella approached them before they could reach the castle, her uncanny abilities tuning her in to the fact she would have visitors that day.

Ember had always been impressed and slightly fascinated by the girl's powers, but today she was having doubts. Dani was placing too much trust in the little girl's powers. What if they weren't as strong as she had thought?

Worse, what if Evella had the power but refused to help.

Dani had been under the assumption that the girl would willingly help them out. What if she decided she liked having Sam around and wanted her to stay? She was still a child, the world revolved around her. She wouldn't be able to see the harm she would be doing by not helping.

The plan seemed like it would work, but you could never depend on the paranormal to remain constant. Murphy's law was a way of life in the Ghost Zone. One day your powers were strong enough to take down anyone, the next day you were beaten by some half-ghost that showed up out of nowhere.

Ember took a deep breath, not wanting to seem worried in front of the girls. Skulker would be here, he would keep an eye out for his daughter. "You three have fun, okay?" She placed a kiss on each of their foreheads.

"Bye, mommy." Viki waved as she flew off towards the castle with her two friends.

"Right this way, gentlemen." Vlad led the two GiW operatives down the halls of Axion Labs to the portal room.

The two operatives gawked at the fully functioning portal. They had dreamed of making their own, but found themselves unsuccessful. The closest thing they came to a real portal was when the purchased the Fenton Works years ago, but that turned out to be dud. The portal blocked off by a strange rock as soon as they had opened it.

Vlad pretended not to notice the open portal, directing the men's attention to the test tubes on a nearby lab table. "It took a while, but we were able to develop the cures you asked for." He took a test tube off the rack and handed it to the darker operative.

"Thank you for your cooperation. The government thanks you and the world thanks you." The operative tucked the tube in his jacket pocket. Through all this, he couldn't take his eyes off the eerie green glow of the portal.

"This is going to be so good for business." Vlad said slightly louder than necessary, drawing the operatives attention away from the open portal. "Why don't you men look around? It's the least I can do to thank you for giving the DALV corporations this opportunity. There might be some equipment which you will find useful."

The operatives were about to speak when the ringing of the phone stopped them short.

"Excuse me." Vlad walked to the desk and answered the phone. There was a long pause in which the operatives simply observed him. "I'll be right there." He hung up the phone and turned back to his two guests. "If you'll excuse me, I have some urgent business to attend to. Feel free to look around while I'm gone, I'll be gone for a few moments." Vlad stepped out of the room leaving the two operatives alone with the open portal.

Danny and Dani sat at the control room, fingers crossed. They watched as the operatives briefly discussed something amongst themselves. They must have agreed on a course of action for they both fiddled with their cuff links. Their backpacks shifted into jetpacks and they took off into the portal.

"Yes!" The two halfas cried in unison as the high fived each other. They had fallen for the bait!

"See, they are so easy to read!" Dani cheered herself on. Phase one of her plan was running smoothly. Time to initiate phase two.

Danny took a nearby walkie-talkie and began speaking into it. "Dan, they should be heading your way, do you see them?"

Dani began shifting the controls on the switchboard, switching the screen to cameras they had placed on Dan, Skulker, and Box Ghost.

"Yeah, I see them." Dan responded through his earpiece.

"Lead them to the kingdom, but try not to let the guards see you. If they figure out we are involved they might not buy into it." Danny shivered, but not from his actions. He was still suffering from cold spells, even though he sat in his pajamas with a blanket wrapped around his shoulders.

Dan didn't respond, but from the camera on his clothing, they were able to see him swiftly fly behind the operatives. He made a sharp turn into them, stealing a few gadgets off their belts before taking off for the Dragon Kingdom.

"Get back here, ghost scum." Cried the lighter one. Those were expensive ghost hunting devices, they had to get them back. HQ would have their head if they knew the devices had been stolen by none other than a ghost. They could not risk letting the ghosts discover the secrets behind their weapons.

The ghost children walked along the perimeter of the walls, searching for ecto-snails buried in the crevice between the ground and the walls.

Viki was completely absorbed with her task, pulling snail after snail out of the dirt. Box Lunch picked up the snails by their shells, examining their slimy undersides. Evella had been alongside the two girls, collecting the snails in a box when she suddenly stood up, dropping the box of snails on the ground.

"Evella, what's wrong?" Viki stopped digging to see what her friend was looking at. She followed her gaze to the top of the wall separating the kingdom from the rest of the Ghost Zone. When she didn't see anything she turned back to the dragon girl, confused. "What are you looking at?"

Silent as ever, Evella held her hands out as something came flying over the castle wall. Several gizmos of sorts landed into her open palms and on the surrounding grass.

What came next frightened the children out of their wits.

The GiW flew over the castle gates, firing their ecto-lasers in all directions. The ghost they had been chasing threw their weapons over the wall and swiftly flew back in the direction from which he had come. They would have to chase him down a later time, what mattered now was getting their weapons back.

The girls screamed and ducked for cover.

The guard immediately sent out a red alert through the kingdom. They were being attacked by human ghost hunters!

The villagers went into a frenzy as parents grabbed their children and ghosts everywhere flew for cover. The stronger ghosts flew to the front intending on protecting their family and their homes from the threat.

The two operatives zeroed in on the girls. They would get both their weapons and test subjects in one go. Wouldn't HQ be pleased? More ghosts to tear apart and experiment on. They were about to fire a net, when they were blasted off course by cube of electrical energy. Through their fall they glimpsed something fly to the girls, taking them out of their sight.

The operatives quickly recovered from their fall and pulled a smoke bomb out. This would split up the forming ghost resistance, making them for easier targets.

Aragon snapped to the sound of the alarm going through the village. Even from the castle gardens, the sound could be heard blaring loudly to all.

Sam looked around too, not recognizing what the sound was. "What's going on?" She asked, noticing several of the castle servants hurrying about in a panic.

"The kingdom is under attack." Aragon took a few steps back, away from Sam.

Sam watched as his eyes changed color and his form changed from that of humanoid to full on dragon. She had seen him transform many times, but was always awed by it. How was it that some ghosts were gifted with such powers while other were doomed to fade away in the constant struggle for power? The dragon itself was such a magnificent creature, and here Aragon was, one of the only remaining dragons in the Ghost Zone.

"Fret not, my dear. I shall return as soon as I have taken care of the insolent intruders." Aragon spoke through his dragon form. He spread out his wings and took off, leaving gusts of winds to blow the dead leaves of the garden in circles around his beloved.

Sam immediately took off for the castle. If she could reach the balcony, she could get a better look.

Box Ghost set the three girls down in the back alley of some work shops.

The girls looked about, fear and confusion in their eyes, as they watched the place quickly transform into a battle field.

Box Lunch clung to her father, scared out of her little mind. "Daddy, what's happening?" She asked.

"The hunters are here." He responded, keeping his remaining eye out for them. "Run to the castle. All of you, run!" He fired more blasts as the hunters split to quell the uprising.

The three girls ran, not wanting to fly through the barrage of lasers and blasts.

The operatives quickly changed courses for the three little girls. Ghost children were weak compared to their adult counterparts, making them perfect test subjects. Not to mention they were rare. If they brought back not one, but three, they were sure to be promoted. The rebellion was mostly ghosts who had never done any major fighting, they were easy to scare off or scatter. A few blasts of this or that and they recoiled to save their afterlife.

Evella quickly led the girls through the maze of alleys and store fronts. She knew where Skulker was hiding to keep watch. If she could get to him, he would be able to hold off the two operatives. And she would be able to initiate the third phase.

Viki and Box Lunch followed their dragon friend. She was older; she had to know what to do. Older people always knew what to do. They were growing weary, their bodies too young to handle such a long period of strenuous running. They wouldn't be able to hold out much longer.

Viki couldn't handle it. She tripped as her legs, all too used to flying, gave way and she fell. Doing the only thing she could, she screamed at the top of her lungs.

Skulker heard a blood-curling scream echo through to his hiding place. His daughter was in trouble! He opened up his jet-packs and flew low to find her.

How could two operatives put up such a good fight? It seemed that the attack range was spreading. Skulker ducked out of the way of blast, veering out of the alleys and to the rooftops. A huge shadow fell over him as a giant black dragon flew overhead.

Aragon!

Skulker ducked back into the alley. Luckily, Aragon had not seen him, but he would have to be even more careful now. He closed his eyes, trying to focus on his daughter's ghost signature. Where had it disappeared to? At last, he felt it coming from only a few meters away. He sped to the source, finding the girls hiding behind barrels of preserves.

Viki flung herself into her father's arms, crying into his muscle shirt. "They're hurt." She pointed to the unconscious Evella and Box Lunch. "I couldn't run…" She broke into more sobs. "…and they tried to stop the hunters, but th-th-they couldn't!" She wiped vigorously at her eyes.

Skulker was relieved to find his daughter alive. He was going to kill the Phantom whelps when he got back, but he couldn't stop now. The biggest danger was over for his daughter and, like a good hunter, he needed her to continue. "Viki, listen to me."

Viki hiccupped, but complied nonetheless.

"We can save your friends, but I need you to keep going. You need to go to the castle and find Dora." Skulker drew an envelope from this pocket and handed it to his daughter. "If you want to save everyone, you have to go to the castle and give this to Dora. Do you understand?"

Viki didn't respond, but continued to cry. She couldn't run anymore. She was tried, her friends were hurt and it was all her fault. She wouldn't be able to make it to the castle, she wouldn't be able to save her friends, and now Sam was in trouble too. This was unfair! Why did she have to go save Sam too? Next her dad would be in trouble and she wouldn't be able to save him either.

Skulker knew this wasn't going to work. He had to try a different approach. "Viki, you want to be a good hunter, right?" He asked over the sound of Aragon's roars.

Viki nodded, paying close attention to her father's words.

"Good hunters always stand strong in the face of adversity. The task may seem impossible, and you may be exhausted, but you have to keep going. You can't stop until you've captured your prey. Now, your prey is Dora. You need to find her without being seen. Remember, if your prey sees you, it will flee. Can you do that? Can you be a good hunter and find Dora without being found yourself?"

Viki felt her courage come back to her. Her father was the Ghost Zone's greatest hunter. She couldn't fail! "Yeah. I can." Her voice slowly built with her courage. She had practiced hunting with her father a thousand, if not millions of times. She could do this! She quickly took the letter from her father and ran off before he could say anything else.

**Yay, I kinda liked this chapter. Sorry about this last part, but I tried my best.**

**Review Please!**


	13. Hunting

**Where'd you go? I missed you so. Seems like it's been forever since you've been gone.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters.**

* * *

Chapter Thirteen: Hunting

The two halfas continued to watch the scene play out before them until they were interrupted by a frantic Vlad.

"They called for backup, the GiW called for backup!" Vlad switched the monitors from the camera on the ghosts back to the security cameras of the building.

Several dozens of agents were pouring into the building and heading straight for the portal room.

"Can't you stop them or something?" Danny watched as their backpacks all turned into jetpacks. "They're going to destroy the entire kingdom!"

"I can't. They have all the legal paperwork, but we can fight them in the Ghost Zone without suspicion." Black rings appeared around Vlad, changing him into Plasmius. "Danielle, you come with me. Daniel, you stay here and call us if anything goes wrong."

"No way! I'm going too!" Danny weakly shifted to his ghostly counterpart. "I've got to save Sam. What if the GiW think she's in with the ghosts and try to kill her for treason? I'm going too."

Vlad didn't say anything at first, just staring at Danny. He gave in. Nothing would stop Danny from getting up and leaving once he and Danielle were gone. "Fine, but you get in there, save Sam, and get back out. No fighting! You haven't fully healed yet."

"Fine." Danny could go along with that as long as he knew Sam would make it out alive.

The three of them turned intangible and phased out of the room.

* * *

Viki quickly clamored over the iron gate separating the castle from the rest of the town. When she reached the top, she jumped off, landing into some bushes.

Reaching the castle hadn't been too hard (her father kept the two hunters at bay), but getting inside would be difficult. More hunters had started appearing, making her task all the more difficult. Not to mention the castle guards she would have to sneak past.

She placed the letter in her mouth and army crawled through the bushes past the fighting ghosts, doing her best to conceal her ghostly signature. The hunter's monitors occasionally sensed her when she could no longer suppress it, but hearing the beeping sent her into a whole new adrenaline rush. She held her breath as a hunter walked right past her, trying to find the ghost signature they had just picked up.

There was only one, walking back and forth.

At this rate, she wouldn't make it to Dora in time. More and more hunters were spilling in from the human world. All she had to do was get into the castle and it would be smooth sailing from there. People would be more worried about defending the palace that they would pay no mind to a little kid running around. She had to end this quickly.

Viki bared her teeth and jumped out of the bushes.

Her father taught her how to kill a human.

Just aim for the throat.

* * *

The three halfas split up when they reached Aragon's Kingdom.

Danny flew high, going hundreds of feet above the fighting to sneak into the castle unnoticed. When he reached the castle's perimeter he landed and stopped to catch his breath. Flying was really taking a toll on him. It had been so long since he had gotten any serious exercise or training.

His head snapped up when he heard a scream. He ran around the edges of the castle, too weak to fly, trying to find the source.

He stopped at the sight in front of him.

Viki had used her sharp teeth to tear the throat of a GiW out.

The white-suited man collapsed, dead. His blood slowly pooled around his body from the open wound in his neck.

Danny swallowed down his nausea as the little girl ran to his side.

"Uncle Danny!" She grabbed onto the pant leg of his hazmat suit. "I can't get in." She frantically ranted. "I have to get this letter, but I can't get in, what do we do? What do we do?"

"Alright, calm down first." Danny used his sleeve to wipe the blood off of her mouth and face. "We can get in easy." He picked the girl up and held her tight against his chest. White rings passed over the both of them. He walked through the wall, clutching the girl tightly, allowing her to pass through along with him.

Viki was surprised. She had never seen any of the halfas phase through objects in their human forms. She wanted to ask him about out, but was pushed along the hallway.

"You go find Dora." Danny told her. "I'm going to save your Auntie Sam."

* * *

Sam shoved the doors to the balcony open and ran outside. She saw Aragon's dragon form tower over everything. He inhaled deeply and blasted the GiW with a wave of fire.

The GiW may be tough, but not this time around. They were not able to take any serious weaponry in because of the size of the portal, forcing them to resort to the handheld gizmos and gadgets they had.

Several other ghosts were fighting alongside Aragon, but it was the sheer numbers of the hunters that made the battle difficult. There was easily over three hundred, and it looked as if more were still coming to join the battle.

She continued to watch the scene before her, ducking when a blast came her way.

Were the GiW already at the castle?

"Samantha, we must remain inside. It is too dangerous out here." Dora pulled the goth girl back inside the castle and shut the doors. She pulled her along to the inner chambers of the castle. They would be safe there. The GiW would have to make through the castle forces before they could reach them. Dora led her to Aragon's bedroom and opened the door. "You'll be safe in here. I must attend to other matters. Please, Samantha, do not move from this spot." She shut the door behind her and left.

* * *

Viki flew through the halls, no longer having to worry about being struck from below, searching for Dora. The ghost princess had not been in her room, outside, or in the library. Viki did not have any idea of where to look for her in a crisis. She saw several members of Aragon's council running in the same direction, opting to follow them instead.

They all headed for the meeting room, quickly filling up the seats to discuss the problem at hand.

Dora would have to show up. If Aragon was fighting outside, she would have to lead this. Viki may not have known much on politics, but she did know that much. She ran through the surprised members, all of whom were calling for her to stop, and placed the envelope on the seat Dora would take.

"Little girl!" One of the council members grabbed her by the back of her shirt and lifted her up. "What are you doing here?"

"I was looking for my mom." Viki quickly covered. "I lost her when the alarm started screaming."

The council member set her back down. "Your mother would not be here." His tone softened, thinking of his own child back home. "You must not venture out of the castle until our king defeats the enemy, but you cannot be in here for the meeting." He ushered her out of the council hall and gently closed the door behind him.

Viki walked down a few halls until she found the library. She plopped herself on one of the cushioned chairs, all to relived to have completed her task.

She was exhausted, but she was happy. Her father would be proud.

* * *

"Sam!"

The girl looked up from her chair at Aragon's desk. He face lit up when her eyes landed on none other than her true love. "Danny! Oh, Danny!" She ran to him and pulled him into a tearful hug. When she pulled away, she ran her hands over his face and hair, making sure he was really there. "Danny, you look awful." Her hands traced the bags underneath his eyes. "What are you doing here?"

"I came to save you." Danny's exhaustion was clearly evident in his voice. "Sam, how could you do that? I would rather be dead than living knowing you're miserable somewhere else."

Sam's tear spilled over as she pulled Danny into a kiss. "Danny, I couldn't watch you die and do nothing."

"That doesn't matter anymore. We're here to save you." Danny smirked. "And were going to _force_ Aragon to give you up."

Sam gave him a confused look.

"Don't worry about it. It's going to work out." He grabbed the crown on her head and placed it on the desk. "Let's go home."

* * *

"Plasmius!" Skulker was surprised to see his employer and the female halfa land beside him.

"We're here to help." Vlad began firing at the nearest agents, taking them out one by one.

"Well you're little plan seems to have gone astray." Skulker spoke mostly to Dani. "You go save the kids. They're behind ration barrels a few alleys from here."

"I'm here to fight." Dani announced firmly.

"Look, now is not the time to be playing hero. Go get the kids out of here before they get killed and find Dan. He will be more useful."

Dani was angry, but she knew it was true. Dan would be able to do more than she could, and it was kind of her fault that the kids were placed in this kind of danger. She promised Box Ghost and Lunch Lady nothing would happen to their kid, it would be her responsibility to see that promise through. She grudgingly flew off to find the kids.

* * *

"The meeting shall now commence." Dora announced to the room. In her hand she held the letter Viki had delivered. "The humans have stated their intentions."

The letter was passed around the room, the council members all gasping when they realized what the hunters wanted.

"We must return Samantha to the humans if they are going to attack us for her." One member spoke up.

"We can fight them off, we have powers they do not." Another spoke up in objection. "The kingdom has gone too long without a queen. We need to ensure that the dragon blood line continues. We cannot return Samantha."

Dora paid no mind to the bickering among the council members. She stared at the letter in her hands. It looked like it was official, but something about it threw her off. The handwriting seemed familiar.

It was Plasmius'! They were trying to get Samantha out of here!

Dora folded the letter and places it on the table in front of her. She would get Samantha out of this castle before it was too late.

* * *

Dani landed outside the portal, a ghost child in each arm. She flew to the medical ward, setting each child down in their own bed.

"Spectra, are you here?" She called loudly.

The lack of response gave her the answer she needed.

The easiest way to find Spectra would be through the control room cameras.

She took off and phased through, but found a sight for sore eyes waiting for her. "Sam!" She pulled the girl into a bone-crushing hug. "You're alright! My plan worked!"

"Yup, I'm alright." Sam wrenched herself out of Dani's grasp. "How are you?"

"I'm fine, but we need to find Spectra. Evella and Box Lunch are out cold in the medical ward."

"On it." Danny, who was back in his human form, picked up the phone and connected to Vlad's office. He quickly relayed the situation to Spectra and hung up.

"Dani, I'm really sorry for what I did before I left." Sam wanted to apologize. She insulted her, insulted everyone else, and knocked her friend out. It was eating away at her guilty conscious.

"Don't worry about it." Dani took Sam's hand into her own. "I understand why you did it. You don't need to worry about it."

* * *

Dora listened to the arguments presented by the council members for formalities sake. She had made up her mind long ago, but didn't want to see to suspicious.

When the final arguments were presented, she stood up.

"I have made my decision."

The council members stopped to hear her out.

"In order to protect the kingdom and its citizens, we shall return Samantha to the humans. It is a shame to lose her, but the needs of our people come before the needs of our king. Isn't that why we were chosen to rule? We rule because we know what's best for the people."

How could the members argue with that?

* * *

Dan arrived at the scene, having been called by Dani. "What do we do?" He asked Vlad. Should he just knock them out, or chase them out?

"We tried reasoning with them." Vlad explained as he put up a shield to stop an onslaught of attacks. "But they won't leave without destroying or capturing every ghost."

"In other words…" Dan felt his bloodlust boiling. "We take them out for good."

To affirm his point, Skulker fired a missile at a few GiW, sending them flying in several bloody pieces.

"Now we're talking." Dan lit his fits with energy.

* * *

**Writing a whole chapter in one sitting. I feel dizzy….**

**On a separate note, I got no reviews on the last chapter. My heart is breaking…**

**Review Please! **


	14. Frozen Air

**Due to some unforeseen circumstances I must end this fic now, or not at all. I understand some of you are upset, but you must admit, this is better than just deleting the fic altogether. **

**Some crazy stuff has hit me like a ton of bricks, and I'm sincerely sorry for this, but I want to thank everyone for sticking with me to the end. **

**It's been a long journey through "Second Chance" and "Frozen Air", but now it's time to come home.**

**Enough with the sappy clichés, let's go!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or other relating characters.**

* * *

Chapter Fourteen: Frozen Air

_One Month Later_

"This is stupid. How did I let you talk me into this one?" Dan slid across the ice, Dani holding onto his arm.

"Oh, quit complaining. This is for them, not for us." Dani gestured to the couple on the other side of the frosted lake.

Sam and Danny skated away peacefully, enjoying each other's company. Danny was teaching Sam how to skate, as she had never done it before. Sam gripped his arms tightly, slipping and sliding all over the place.

Dani couldn't help but smile at the sight. This was the way it should have always been.

_After rescuing Sam, the battle between the ghosts and ghost hunters ensued, but didn't last long. Dan and Aragon combined were able to put a quick stop to it. _

_Aragon was outraged to discover that the council had ruled to let Sam go. He knew everything they said was true, but he didn't want to lose Sam for a second time. He had been so close. The experience made him more reclusive. He stopped venturing to the human world to visit Sam and avoided interacting with others whenever he could. _

_The kingdom eventually returned to its normal life of bustling citizens and busy shopping places. The decree barring the halfas was revoked, leaving them free to visit their friends at any time._

_Danny and Sam quickly made up for the time they spent apart. They were just happy to be back with each other. _

_The ghost children turned out to be just fine. Their wounds were minor and Viki was later returned to her anxious mother by Dora. _

_Dora kept the secret of the letter from her brother and the rest of the council. After adjourning the meeting, she had quickly set fire to the letter, destroying any evidence that it might have been forged. Aragon had begun developing suspicions to what really influenced the council's decisions, so she could not take any chances. He spent weeks divulging into the matter, but could not bring up enough evidence against Dora. As imagined, this put a strain between their relationship, but what could he do? _

_Danny eventually recovered, regaining all his vigor and energy. Relief was not a strong enough word to describe what everyone felt the first time he ate a full meal without throwing it back up. He had to do a bit of extra training to rebuild his stamina, and swallow down some disgusting medication his parents concocted, but it was for the better._

_Jack and Maddie gave up hunting ghosts, though the still produced several weapons for Axion Labs and Danny. They figured the kids had a better shot at it and Jack was getting old. His poor back just couldn't keep up with the need for ghost hunters in Amity Park. _

_Through all this, Sam and Danny became much closer. Much, much closer. Vlad was actually worried that they might develop separation anxiety, but he let it go, it was probably just the teenage hormones acting up._

"Come on. At least try and look like you want to be here." Dani tugged at Dan's arm, making him slide faster across the ice.

"You know, I thought this lake doesn't freeze over in the winter." Dan steadied himself to keep from falling.

"It doesn't. Danny and I froze it so we could all go ice skating." Sure enough, she and Danny had come here a few hours earlier. They stuck their hands in the water, letting their energy flow through it until the entire lake had frozen solid.

Once they got everyone together they all headed out.

The ectoplasmic material in the lake would melt the ice, but not for another hour two, giving them plenty of time to skate before it became too dangerous.

Tucker and Valerie sped by, almost knocking Dani over, having their own little race.

"Sorry, Dani!" Valerie called back, not watching where she was going. She crashed into Tucker, who had stopped to avoid crashing into Sam.

The fall caused him to go down, bringing Sam down, and finally bringing Danny down with her until the four of them were a heap on the ice.

"Now I feel a little better about coming here." Dan snickered at the fallen teens.

"Well, if you don't want to be here, where do you propose we go?" Dani asked him, skating around him in circles all the while.

"How about we go somewhere private?" Dan held his arm out, catching Dani as she continued to loop around him. "You know, just the two of us."

Dani giggled, quickly getting his drift. "Why didn't you just say so from the start?"

"I did when I said 'I don't want to go ice skating'."

Dani laughed and switched forms. "Something came up!" She called to her friends whom were trying to get off the ice to no avail. "Dan and I gotta go."

The group waved them off, before returning to their task at hand.

The two took off to the sky, flying through the low clouds of winter. Dani laughed, watching her breath drift out of sight through the frozen air.

* * *

**Short epilogue, but I like it, considering it's a rush job and all.**

**That's it, that's the end folks! No sequel to this!**

**It's been an interesting experience writing for an obscure pairing, and I couldn't have done it without my wonderful reviewers. Thank you or sticking with me to the very end! Don't forget to review the last chapter!**

**-Hanajima**


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